


Earth's Mightiest Heroes

by itscatastrophic



Category: Glee, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, F/M, Gen, Marvel movie with Glee characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-04
Updated: 2013-10-04
Packaged: 2017-12-22 09:33:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 29,939
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/911666
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itscatastrophic/pseuds/itscatastrophic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is basically the retelling of The Avengers, but with my favorite Glee characters. Enjoy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> While I may not be happy with the show's direction, or character choices, I still love the actors and (some) of their characters.  
> I own nothing. Enjoy.

In space, we see a floating staircase among the rocks. A tall woman with dirty blonde hair speaks to someone sitting in a chair with their backs turned.

"The Tesseract has awakened. It is on a little world, a human world. One from which we both hail. The humans would wield its power." She takes and hands a scepter to a male figure, his face hidden. The scepter has a glowing blue gem near the tip.

"But our ally knows its workings as they never will. He is ready to lead. And our force..." An alien warrior puts on their face mask, and in a ripple effect, see hundreds more alien warriors do the same thing. "...our Chitauri, will follow."

She continues to speak to the figure in the chair. "The world will be his... the universe, yours. And the humans, what can they do, but BURN?"

\----------

Earth, at night. A mountain range in the desert. A helicopter speeds over the mountain at high speed. We pan up over the mountain and we see a giant base, covering many square miles. And there is a frantic evacuation in progress.

Within the base, agents, scientists, and other personnel rush around the base frantically. An intercom states "All personnel, evacuation order has been confirmed. Proceed to your designated vehicles for all campus evacuation." Security guards direct traffic. More agents assist people, some stuff the trunks of their cars and leave the campus. The helicopter continues over the base, which has a sign describing it as the "Joint Dark Energy Mission, Western Division; Project New Direction, NASA Space Radiation Facility; SHIELD Accelerator Test Facility." The intercom continues "This is not a drill. Emergency personnel proceed to your designated vehicles for all campus evacuation."

The helicopter hovers over a landing pad. There is a man in a suit waiting, wearing sunglasses, as the helicopter lands. He is Kurt Hummel, agent of SHIELD. The door opens and two people come out. First is a shorter woman with dark hair, also in a SHIELD uniform. She is agent Santana Lopez. Behind her comes a tall man, with curly hair and an eyepatch, wearing a trenchcoat. His name is Will Schuester, the director of SHIELD. The two approach the waiting man.

"How bad is it?"

"That's the problem, sir." Kurt removes his sunglasses, his mouth in a firm line. "We don't know."

They turn and enter the base. They take an elevator underground as Kurt describes what happened.

"Dr. Howell read an energy surge from the Tesseract four hours ago."

Schuester glances at him with a furrowed brow, "NASA didn't authorize Howell to go to test phase."

"He wasn't testing it. He wasn't even in the room. Spontaneous event."

"It just turned itself on?" Santana asks, the surprise evident in her voice. Kurt gives her a curt nod.

"What are the energy levels now?" Schuester asks Kurt.

"Climbing. When Howell couldn't shut it down, we ordered evac."

"How long to get everyone out?"

"Campus should be clear in the next half hour."

"Do better." Schuester says to Kurt, as Santana and him continue on. Kurt turns around and heads back to the surface. They head down a staircase as Kurt continues evacuation.

"Sir, evacuation may be futile."

"Should we tell everyone to go back to sleep?"

Santana sighs and says, "If we can't control the Tesseract's energy, we don't know the minimum safe distance. There might not be one."

"I know. I need you to make sure the Phase Two prototypes are shipped out."

Santana slightly raises her eyebrows. "Sir, is that really a priority right now?"

Schuester cuts in, sharply, "Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on." He continues to a doorway, turns back to look at her and orders, "Clear out the tech below. Every piece of Phase Two on a truck and gone."

"Yes, sir." She approaches the two guards guiding the doorway, and beckons them towards her. "With me."

As Santana leaves with the guards, Will continues on to the Tesseract room.

It's a large, cavernous room, with banks of computers hooked up. In the middle, a glowing blue cube sits in a device, pointed toward a staging area nearby. Will makes his way over to a handsome man with dark hair. He is looking into a computer with small frown upon his face. This is Carl Howell, a scientist.

"Talk to me, Doctor." Schuester says as he makes his way towards the doctor.

Carl looks up from his screen and sees Schuester approaching him, "Director," he says in a way of greeting, and meets him halfway.

"Is there anything we know for certain?"

"The Tesseract is misbehaving."

Schuester arches a lone eyebrow, "Is that supposed to be funny?"

Carl slightly shakes his head and gestures with his hands. "The Tesseract's not only active, she's…behaving."

"How soon can you pull the plug?"

"She's an energy source. We turn off the power, she just turns it back on. If she reaches peak level- "

Schuester cuts him off, "We prepared for this, Doctor. Harnessing energy from space."

"We don't have the harness, sir. My calculations are far from complete." Carl says, as Schuester turns to look at the device the Tesseract is connected to. "She's throwing off interference, radiation. Nothing harmful, low levels of Gamma radiation."

Schuester turns back and faces Dr. Howell. "That can be harmful…" He says with a bit of significance. He looks around and asks, "Where's Agent Chang?"

Carl scoffs and shakes his head a bit, "The hawk?" He gestures up to the rafters near the ceiling over his shoulder. "Up in his nest, as usual."

Up on a balcony, a tall, Asian man in SHIELD tactical gear is observing the lab. This is Mike Chang, codename Hawkeye, another SHIELD agent. He's sitting on the rafters and is resting against a support beam, his eyes never stop scanning the scene below him. We hear the static of his comm device turning on and the voice of Will Schuester as he says, "Chang. Report."

He gets up and zip-lines down a rope.

"I gave you this detail so you could keep a close eye on things." Schuester says to Mike as they walk back toward the Tesseract.

"I see better from a distance."

"Well, have you seen anything that might set this thing off?"

"Doctor! It's spiking again," A scientist says from behind a computer screen and looks towards Dr. Howell. Carl heads over as Schuester and Mike step onto the platform, in front of the Tesseract machine, looking at it.

"No one's come or gone. Howell is clean. No contacts, no IM's." Mike crosses his arms and looks towards the director. "I think if there's any tampering, sir, it wasn't this end."

Schuester's brow furrows and looks up at Agent Chang. "At this end?" He asks.

Mike looks at the Tesseract and says, "Yeah. The cube is some kind of…doorway into space, right?" He shrugs and looks back at Schuester. "Well, doors open from both sides."

The cube sparks. Dr. Howell looks up from the computer screen, "What's that?"

It sparks again. Outside, Kurt is standing next to a truck when the ground shakes. Kurt grabs the truck for support.

Inside, in the garage, Santana turns and looks around her, hearing a creaking noise as the building shakes.

Back inside the Tesseract room, the cube sparks some more, bigger each time. Suddenly, a beam of energy shoots out of it, stopping at the staging area nearby. After several seconds, there is an explosion of energy. Some of the blue energy gathers near the roof and stays there, crackling.

Back on the platform, everyone realizes there is a person kneeling there. The person slowly stands to reveal a man holding a scepter with a blue glow near the tip. This is Jesse, the god of mischief from Asgard. Several guards move in slowly, guns drawn.

Jesse, who had been looking down, slowly looks up, grinning menacingly. He looks around at the approaching guards. Dr. Howell is looking on in awe and horror. Will and Mike are ready to act.

Schuester is the first to act and yells towards the man, "Sir, please put down the spear!"

Jesse looks down at the scepter, then back up. He then quickly thrusts it forward, firing a bolt of blue energy at them. Mike pushes Schuester out of the way as some computers explode. The guards and Mike then open fire. Jesse jumps at the guards, spearing one as bullets hit off him. He spins and throws some small daggers at the rest of the guards, embedding them in their necks. Jesse fires more energy at the scientists, making Mike dive out of the way. Jesse looks around, almost surprised that it's over that fast.

Mike staggers to his feet. Jesse leaps over to him. Mike reaches for his gun and tries to fire, but Jesse blocks it and holds his arm. Mike tries to fight back, but is surprised at the amount of strength by this one man.

"You have heart." Jesse touches the tip of the spear to Mike's chest and energy seems to enter his body. You see bright blue run through his veins as they move upward toward his brain. His eyes turn solid black before becoming ice blue. He takes his arm back from Jesse… and puts his gun away. Jesse moves to another agent and does the same as he's done to Mike.

Will, seeing this, pulls the cube from the machine it was in and shuts it in a briefcase. He then gets up to leave.

"Please don't." Jesse says, as he turns back to Schuester. "I still need that."

Will turns around slowly and says, "This doesn't have to get any messier."

"Of course it does. I've come too far for anything else. I am Jesse, of Asgard. And I am burdened with glorious purpose."

Carl, who had been checking the pulse of another scientist, hears this and approaches, "Jesse, brother of Samuel?"

Jesse's jaw clenches and he sneers in contempt at his brother's name.

Schuester notices Jesse's reaction, but says, "We have no quarrel with your people."

Jesse looks back towards Schuester and says simply, "An ant has no quarrel with a boot."

"Are you planning to step on us?" Schuester asks with a slightly harder tone.

"I come with glad tidings, of a world made free."

"Free from what?"

"Freedom. Freedom is life's great lie. Once you accept that, in your heart-" He turns and places the spear tip on Dr. Howell's chest. The blue energy flows into him. "-you will know peace."

"Yeah, you say peace. I kinda think you mean the other thing."

The energy cloud brews darker. Mike notices, and steps towards Jesse.

"Sir, Director Schuester is stalling. This place is about to blow and drop a hundred feet of rock on us." Mike sends a glare towards the director. "He means to bury us."

"Like the pharaohs of old." Schuester says with an edge.

"He's right," Carl says as he looks over a computer screen. He looks up and then adds, "The portal is collapsing in on itself. We've got maybe two minutes before this goes critical."

Jesse gives him a small nod and then turns towards Agent Chang and says, "Well then."

Mike quickly draws his gun and shoots Will, who drops the briefcase. Everyone else makes to leave, Mike picking up the briefcase as he, Jesse, Dr. Howell, and another agent leave the room.

They all enter the garage, Mike handing the briefcase to Carl. Santana comes over to meet them.

"We need these vehicles," Mike says, and points to two trucks. 

Santana furrows her brow a bit, but doesn't question him. When she sees Jesse, she asks, "Who's that?"

"He didn't tell me," Mike says while walking over the truck.

The roof above is slowly crumbling. Jesse gets onto a pickup truck. Carl enters the passenger seat, holding the case.

Santana's brows furrow a bit more, but she stays silent. She slowly turns away.

In the Tesseract room, Will slowly sits up, taking the bullet out of a Kevlar vest. He speaks into his radio. "Lopez!" He grunts and then speaks into his radio again, "Do you copy?...Chang…has turned."

Back in the garage, Mike hears and draws his gun, spinning around. Santana dives behind a stack of boxes as Mike opens fire. He backs toward the car, firing his gun, and gets in. Santana peeks out and returns fire as Mike drives them away.

In the Tesseract room, Will staggers to his feet and rushes out as fast as he can. The energy cloud gets bigger and bigger above him. The lab is starting to fall apart.

Schuester speaks into his radio, and sends orders to Lopez, "Get the Tesseract. Shut them down."

In the garage, Santana throws her radio into the front seat of a Jeep. She jumps in after and speeds away, trying to catch up with Mike.

In the underground tunnel, many agents are chasing Mike's pickup. Jesse fires a bolt of energy from the spear, flipping a car over on its head - blocking the pursuing vehicles and fleeing cars.

In the Tesseract room, the portal begins to collapse as Will tries to escape. Falling debris misses him by a few inches.

In front of the building, Kurt is assisting evacuation, supervising guards as they wheel crates. An explosion rocks the building. They all fall as the roof dissolves faster.

"Let's just go," Kurt says, quickly. He sees the four guards try to pick up the case. "No-no-no! Leave it, leave it. Go!"

Back in the tunnel, Mike speeds up because he's coming up on an intersection. Santana comes speeding out of a side tunnel read ahead of them. She grabs the emergency brake, spinning the Jeep around - coming face to face with Mike, who shoots through her window. Santana ducks and returns fire, firing through the windshield.

Up top, Kurt and the guards climb into the canopy of a truck.

Kurt speaks into his radio, his words meant for the director. "We're clear upstairs, sir..." At the helicopter landing pad, Will runs to the waiting chopper. Over Schuester's radio we hear Kurt again as he says, "...we need to go."

Will gets into the last helicopter, which takes off as the ground beneath begins to crack.

In the tunnel, Mike fires at Santana one more time. She fires back, and finally Mike shrugs the Jeep off and swings in front of Santana. The SHIELD agent turns her Jeep around and continues to speed after them. In the Tesseract room, the energy cloud explodes.

Up above, the ground falls in on itself. In Will's helicopter, he watches in horror. The entire base slowly collapses in on itself. In the tunnel, the ceiling of the tunnel falls, trapping Santana and other agents underground. Jesse looks at the exit to see if they will make it out.

In the truck, Kurt and the others stare at the ground behind their truck - the ground is still collapsing, seconds behind their vehicle. But they get away in time. All of the expansive base...is just crumbling before their eyes.

Off in the desert, Jesse and the others escape the tunnel seconds before the exit is covered up by the fallen ceiling.

As they drive along, Will's chopper chases them. Mike drives frantically as Will shoots at them from the sky. Jesse blasts the helicopter with energy and it falls from the sky.

Will jumps to the ground right before it crashes, the rotor chewing up the ground.

Will rolls to his feet and continues to fire as the truck drives off in the distance.

"Director," We cut back to the truck, Kurt with a worried look on his face. He speaks into his radio again. "Director Schuester, do you copy?"

Back with Will, he picks up his radio, looking serious. Schuester speaks into his radio and says, "The Tesseract is with a hostile force. I have men down." He then asks, "Lopez?"

Back in the tunnel, Santana gets out of her crushed vehicle.

Santana speaks into her radio, "A lot of men still under. Don't know how many survivors." Over her radio we hear Schuester's orders, "Sound a general call. I want every living soul not working rescue looking for that briefcase." Santana sighs and then replies, "Roger that."

We go back to Kurt in the truck, listening intently to his radio, "Kurt, get back to base. This is a level seven. As of right now...we are at war."

After a frightened pause, Kurt speaks into his radio, "What do we do?" Back with Will, he puts his radio down, sighs, and thinks of what to do.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry for the name change of Tina, but I felt like in this world, when you work for SHIELD, and everyone refers to your last name, two Changs would be a little confusing. Plus, it's always irritated me that they have the same last name and that the creators always poked fun about them being related, even after they started dating. 
> 
> Also, in my headcannon, Tina's full name is Christina, so that's why I added it in. 
> 
> If it offends anyone, sorry, but think of it as artistic license or something.

A Russian warehouse, at night. We see a pretty, Asian woman tied to a chair. This is Christina Wu, code name Black Widow, agent of SHIELD. She is being interrogated by three men. The man in charge, Rick Nelson, has on a General's uniform.

One of Nelson's goons walks over and gives the woman a hard slap to her face, making her head snap to the side. She shows no signs of pain, but purses her lips. She faces forward when she hears Nelson start speaking in Russian.

"This isn't how I wanted this evening to go," he says with a slight leer on her face.

Christina doesn't miss the look, and answers back in flawless Russian. "I know how you wanted this evening to go." She gives him a slight glare and continues, "Believe me, this is better."

Nelson's eyes harden. "Who are you working for? Azimio, right?" The thug that slapped her walks over to Christina, and leans the chair over a pit. She becomes scared, and her eyes dart between the thug and Nelson. Nelson continues speaking, "Does he think we have to go through him to move our cargo?"

The thug puts her down, and look of confusion crosses over Christina's face. "I thought Karofsky was in charge of the export business."

Nelson scoffs and gives a little smile. "Karofsky. A bagman, a front. Your outdated information betrays you." He walks closer to her and with a patronizing look says, "The famous Black Widow is just another pretty face."

Christina gives him a wide-eyed look, "You really think I'm pretty?"

Nelson walks away to a table behind him, while a thug grabs her jaw and forces it open.

"Tell Azimio we don't need him to move the tanks. Tell him he's out. Well..." He picks up a pair of pliers of the table and plays with them. He looks over at her and says in English, "You may have to write it down."

Suddenly a phone rings. The other thug, after searching for a second, takes a phone out of his jacket and answers it.

He looks towards Nelson and says, "It's for her."

Nelson drops the pliers on the table and snatches the phone out of his hand. "You listen carefully-"

He's cut off by Kurt. In a no nonsense tone he says, "You're at 114 Zelinski Plaza, 3rd floor. We have an F-22 exactly eight miles out. Put the woman on the phone or I will blow up the block before you can make the lobby.

After a shocked second, Rick hands the phone to Christina, who holds it up to her ear with her shoulder.

She's not surprised to hear Kurt's voice. "We need you to come in."

"Are you kidding? I'm working"

"This takes precedence."

Christina sounds a little exasperated, but tells Kurt, "I'm in the middle of an interrogation, this moron is telling me everything."

In a small voice, Nelson says, "What? I don't give... everything."

Christina manages to arch an eyebrow his way and gives him a disbelieving look. She goes back to Kurt, "Look, you can't pull me out of this right now.

Miles away, in a base of some kind, Kurt looks a bit ragged and tense. He looks sad to have to tell her the news. "Tina," Kurt sighs, and adds softly, "Mike's been compromised."

Hearing this, Tina's face goes stoic. She takes a breath, and tells Kurt, "Let me put you on hold."

Tina looks at Nelson, and as he moves in for the cell phone. Tina kicks him between the legs and then headbutts him. One thug swings his fist at her and she ducks underneath, kicking him back. The other thug runs up and she spins around - and the chair legs hit him. The first thug jumps to his feet. Tina rolls with the chair and drops the legs on his feet. She whips her head at him and hits him in the nose then trips him.

As she fights the thugs, Kurt listens to the fight over the phone patiently. He stands quiet, almost bored, waiting as he hears the groaning, kicking, and punching.

Tina spring boards off one thug's back, somersaults, and breaks the chair on the other thug. The first one grabs her and Tina bends his hand then hits him with the chair leg. She does a front dropkick against the thug then pushes herself off the ground with both hands. She runs toward the remaining thug, who is out of breath, and flips him with her thighs. Rick stands and Tina swiftly walks over to the chain hanging from the ceiling. As he approaches, she hits him with it, wraps one of his legs around it, and throws him into the pit. She leaves him hanging upside down and picks up the cell and her high heels.

She puts the phone to her ear, and asks, "Where's Mike now?"

"We don't know."

"But he's alive?"

"We think so."

Back at base, Kurt is looking at a screen that's playing a video of Mike and Tina in Vietnam, Mike shooting arrows in all directions from a bow and Tina firing a gun.

"We'll brief you on everything when you get back." He sees another agent with a folder, and holds his hand out to get it. Kurt walks down some stairs as he talks. "But first, we need you to talk to the big guy."

Tina slightly scoffs, and there's a small smile on her face. "Kurt, you know that Puckerman trusts me about as far as he can throw me."

Kurt looks almost smug as he says, "Oh, I've got Puckerman. You get the big guy."

The small smile drops from her face and she stops in her tracks, shocked at what Kurt has just said. "Shit..."

\----------

The slums of Calcutta, at night. A young girl sprints across a busy street. She runs through a crowd of people, rushing down an busy alleyway. She runs into a house and up the stairs. A woman approaches her. A man with curly hair is helping treat the ill in the background with a volunteer group.

A woman notices the little girl, and starts speaking in Hindi, "Who are you? Get out! There is sickness here!"

The young girl seems frantic, she sees the man and rapidly asks, "Are you the American? I need American knowledge. My father. My father's not waking up! He has a fever and he's moaning but his eyes won't open."

The man hears and turns around, drying his hands. We see that it is Dr. Blaine Anderson. He moves over to the young girl and kneels before her. He holds his hands up, and answers her in Hindi, "Slow down."

"My father-"

Blaine sees the panic in her eyes when she sees the ill. He looks over to them, and asks, "Like them?"

The young girl nods and holds up a wad of cash. She gives him a pleading look, and says with a voice full of emotion, "Please!"

\----------

Later, on the outskirts of the city. The young girl is rushing to reach the shack but Blaine grabs her and stops her as a truck drives across their path. Blaine turns his back and glances at it as it passes. Then he and the girl walk across the dirt road. The girl sprints into the shack and Blaine follows slowly. Blaine walks through the door and enters in time to see her escape through the window. He's been ditched and he realizes he's been set up.

Blaine sighs, and says quietly, "Should have gotten paid up front, Anderson."

In the back, we see Tina emerge from the shadows. "For a man who's supposed to be avoiding stress, you picked a hell of a place to settle."

Blaine hears her voice, and turns to face her. He's wary of her, but answers, "Avoiding stress isn't the secret."

Tina has a little smirk on her face, and then asks, "Then what is it? Yoga?"

Blaine ignores the question and slowly starts walking around the small shack."You brought me to the edge of the city. Smart." He peers out through the window, and says, "I, uh, assume the whole place is surrounded."

Tina removes her shawl, revealing more American clothing underneath, and says, "Just you and me."

"And your actress buddy?" Blaine points towards the window the girl ran out of, "Is she a spy too, they start that young?"

In an honest tone, Tina replies, "I did."

Blaine looks at her and asks, "Who are you?"

"Christina Wu."

"Are you here to kill me, Ms. Wu? 'Cause that's not going to work out for everyone."

"No, of course not. I'm here on behalf of SHIELD."

Blaine seems a little irritated when he hears the name, "SHIELD. How'd they find me?"

"We never lost you. We've kept our distance, even helped keep some other interested parties off your scent."

"Why?" Blaine wonders.

"Director Schuester seems to trust you. But now we need you to come in."

"What if I say no?"

In a seductive, but stern tone, Tina answers with a small smile, "I'll persuade you."

Blaine looks down and asks a little reluctantly, "And what if the- Other Guy says no?"

"You've been more than a year without an incident. I don't think you want to break that streak."

Blaine pushes at an old wooden cradle in the living room, it creaks. "Well, I don't always get what I want."

Getting straight to the point, Tina says, "Doctor, we're facing a potential global catastrophe."

Blaine chuckles, "Oh, now those I actively try to avoid."

Tina takes a seat at a table near the living room. "This is the Tesseract." She slides a cell phone across the table towards Blaine."It has the potential energy to wipe out the planet."

Blaine approaches and picks up the cell phone. He sees the cube and tries to study it as much as he can through the image. "What does Schuester want me to do? Swallow it?"

"He wants you to find it. It's been taken. It emits a Gamma signature that's too weak for us to trace. No one knows Gamma radiation like you do. If there was, that's where I'd be."

Blaine looks up at her and asks, "So Schuester isn't after the monster?"

Tina shakes her head, "Not that he's told me."

"And he tells you everything?"

In a slightly defensive tone, she replies, "Talk to Schuester, he needs you on this."

Blaine almost snaps, "He needs me in a cage?"

"No one's going to put you in a-"

"STOP LYING TO ME!" He yells, crashing his hands down on the table.

Tina stands quickly, pulling a gun from under the table and aims it at him.

Blaine draws back, smiling. "I'm sorry. That was mean." He smiles again and adds, "I just wanted to see what you'd do."

Tina stares at him with slightly glassy eyes, and an almost unnoticeable tremor goes through her. She is scared out of her mind.

Blaine continues, "Why don't we do this the easy way, where you don't use that and the- Other Guy doesn't make a mess? Okay?...Tina."

Tina slowly lowers her weapon and brings her hand up to her right ear, activating her comm device. Quietly, she says, "Stand down. We're good here."

Outside the house, in fact, is surrounded. The horde of armed guards surrounding the shack lower their weapons and back up.

Calmly, Blaine says, "Just you and me, huh?"

Tina realizes he knows, gives him a look, and stands silent.


	3. Chapter 3

In a communications room, Will Schuester is talking to his superior, Congressman Figgins, whose face is never illuminated, on a video monitor.

"This is out of line, Schue. You're dealing with forces you can't control." 

"You ever been in a war, congressman? In a fire fight? Did you feel an overabundance of control?"

"You're saying that this... Asgard is declaring war on our planet?"

"Not Asgard, Jesse. One of their gods." 

"He can't be working alone. What about the other one, his brother?"

"Our intelligence says Samuel is not a hostile. But he's worlds away and we can't depend on him to help either. It's up to us." 

"Which is why you should be focusing on Phase Two, it was designed for exactly this purpose."

With a little aggravation seeping into his voice, Schuester says, "Phase Two isn't ready, our enemy is. We need a response team."

"The Avengers Initiative was shut down." 

"This isn't about the Avengers."

"We're running the world's greatest covert security network and you're gonna leave the fate of the human race to a handful of freaks."

"I'm not leaving anything to anyone. We NEED a response team. These people may be isolated, unbalanced even, but I believe, with the right push, they can be exactly what we need." Exasperation is evident in Schuester's voice. 

Figgins scoffs, "You believe! War isn't won by sentiment, Director."

"No. It's won by soldiers."

\----------

In a gym at night, Finn Hudson, alter ego of Captain America, is hitting a punching bag.

His face is contorted in discomfort and pain, but not due to his workout. 

He's thinking about the war. 

_He remembers flying a plane. "There's not enough time. I gotta put her in the water."_

He hits the bag harder, and faster. 

_He squeezes his eyes and remembers Quinn. Her beautiful face and lovely voice saying goodbye to him. "You won't be alone."_

He hits the bag even faster.

_He remembers cold, the ice. He remembers being poked and prodded by a SHIELD Scientist, "Oh my God. This guy's still alive!"_

Finn throws the hardest punch he has left and it knocks the bag across the room, smashing it against the wall. Breathing hard, Finn picks up another bag - from a line of about a dozen - on the floor and hangs it up. He prepares, and then begins to hit it again. 

"Trouble sleeping?" Schuester says making himself known, enters the room slowly. 

Finn looks over his shoulder, but continues hitting the bag. "Slept for seventy years, sir. I think I've had my fill."

"Then you should be out, celebrating, seeing the world." 

Finn stops, takes a breath, and says, "When I went under, the world was at war. I wake up- they say we won. They didn't say what we lost."

"We've made some mistakes along the way, some very recently."

Finn walks towards his things and starts removing his hand wrap. "You here with a mission, sir?"

"I am."

Finn removes his other hand wrap. "Trying to get me back in the world?"

"Trying to save it." He hands Finn a folder with information on the Tesseract. 

Finn, in a low voice, "HYDRA's secret weapon."

"Howard Puckerman fished that out of the ocean when he was looking for you. He thought what we think. The Tesseract could be the key to unlimited sustainable energy. That's something the world sorely needs." 

Finn hands the folder back, and asks knowingly, "Who took it from you?"

"He's called Jesse, but he's... not from around here. There's a lot we'll have to bring you up to speed on if you're in. The world has gotten even stranger than you already know." 

Finn lightly scoffs, "At this point I doubt anything would surprise me." He gets up, grabs his duffel bag, and another punching bag while Schuester is talking.

"Ten bucks says you're wrong. There's a debriefing packet waiting for you back at your apartment." As he watches Finn leaves, he asks, "Is there anything you can tell us about the Tesseract that we ought to know now?" 

Finn doesn't stop walking when he says, "You should have left it in the   
ocean."

\----------

Underwater, at night. Iron Man, AKA Noah Puckerman, is underwater near a large pipe. He uses a laser on his suit to cut it open. Then he attaches a device to the wires in the pipe. The device begins to glow. 

Puck turns and flies up out of the water and towards the city. He begins talking with Rachel Berry on this headset. 

"Good to go on this end, Rach. The rest is up to you."

Over his headset, he hears Rachel ask, "You disconnected the transmission lines? Are we off the grid?"

"Puckerman Tower's about to become a beacon of self-sustaining clean energy."

"Well, assuming the arc reactor takes over and it actually works."

Puck is flying through the streets of midtown Manhattan. He turns a corner and heads right for Puckerman Tower, in the middle.

"I assume. Light her up."

The lights slowly come on. The tall building, adorned with Noah's last name next to a small pad near the roof, lights up.

"How does it look?" Rachel asks, with awe in her voice.

"Like Christmas, but with more...me." Puck says smugly. 

"We've got to go wider on the public awareness campaign. You need to do some press."

Puck flies over an overpass and up the side of Puckerman Tower. 

Rachel continues talking, "I'm in DC tomorrow. I'm working on the zoning for the next three buildings."

"Babe, you're killing me at the moment. Remember, enjoy the moment."

Rachel let's out a little laugh, and with a seductive tone says, "Then get in here and I will." 

Iron Man lands on the landing pad of the tower. As he walks along the walkway, robotic arms start deconstructing his armor, piece by piece.

JARVIS' voice comes in over his headset, "Sir, Agent Hummel of SHIELD is on the line." 

"I'm not in," Puck takes in his surroundings and continues, "I'm actually out."

"Sir, I'm afraid he's insisting."

"Grow a spine, JARVIS," He looks inside and sees Rachel studying the computer, a small smile graces his lips, "I got a date."

Inside the building, Rachel stands in front of a holographic display. The shorter woman looks a little confused. 

"Levels are holding steady," She worries her lip a bit, "I think."

"Of course they are, I was directly involved. Which leads me to my next question. How does it feel to be a genius?"

He turns off the display, and Rachel and he face each other.

Rachel let's out a little laugh, "Well, I really wouldn't know, now would I?"

"What do you mean? All this came from you."

"No, all this came from that." She taps Puck's arc reactor on his chest.

"Give yourself some credit, please. Puckerman Tower is your baby. Give yourself...twelve percent of the credit."

"Twelve percent?" Rachel asks with a bit of disbelief in her voice. 

"An argument can be made for fifteen!" Puck says quickly when he realizes the tone her voice. 

Rachel walks toward the living room. With a little more annoyance in her voice, she repeats, "Twelve percent of my baby?"

"Well, I did do all the heavy lifting. Literally, I lifted the heavy things. And sorry but, the security snafu? That was on you."

"Oh?"

"My private elevator-"

"You mean our elevator," Rachel cuts in quickly, while pouring champagne into two glasses.

"Yeah, it was teeming with sweaty workmen." He realizes what he's been saying and asks, "I'm going to pay for that comment about percentages in some subtle way later, aren't I?" 

Rachel gives him a sweet smile, and hands him his champagne, "Not gonna be that subtle."

"I'll tell you what, next building is gonna say 'Berry' on the tower."

"On the lease!" She says and holds her glass out to toast. 

Puck pulls back at the last second, and says in a joking manner, "Call your dad, can you bunk over?"

"Sir, the telephone. I'm afraid my protocols are being overridden," JARVIS says with some confusion in his voice. 

"Ah," Puck picks up his high-tech phone and holds it up.

On the screen, Kurt says, "Mr. Puckerman, we need to talk."

"You have reached the Life Model Decoy of Noah Puckerman," he tries to keep his face straight as Rachel laughs in the background. "Please leave a message."

"This is urgent."

"Then leave it urgently."

The elevator suddenly opens and Kurt comes out, hanging up his phone. "Mr. Puckerman."

"Security breach," Puck says calmly and then looks to Rachel, "That's on you."

She lightly rolls her eyes, and looks to Kurt, "Kurt! Come in!"

Puck and Rachel get up and walk towards Kurt, Puck with some confusion on his face.

"Kurt?" Puck asks to himself more than to Rachel. 

"I can't stay," Kurt says to Rachel. 

"Uh, his first name is Agent."

Rachel ignores his comment, "Come on in, we're celebrating."

Puck puts on a big, fake smile and says, "Which is why he can't stay."

Kurt, with a laptop in his hands says to Puck, "We need you to look this over, as soon as possible." 

He tries to hand it over, but Puck just kinda backs away and says, "I don't like being handed things."

Rachel intervenes and says, "That's fine, because I love to be handed things. So, let's trade." 

Rachel swaps with Kurt, he has her glass and she has the laptop. She then takes Puck's glass as he rolls his eyes and then passes the laptop on to him.

Rachel smiles and says, "Thank you."

"Official consulting hours are between eight and five every other Thursday." Puck says to Kurt. 

"This isn't a consultation."

"Is this about the Avengers?" Rachel asks. Kurt gives her a look. "Which I know nothing about," she adds on quickly. 

Puck heads toward his work station, and says, "The Avengers Initiative was scrapped, I thought, and I didn't even qualify."

Rachel looks toward Kurt and says, "I didn't know that either."

"Yeah, apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, don't play well with   
others."

Rachel nods slowly, "THAT I did know."

"This isn't about personality profiles anymore," Kurt says looking towards Puck. 

Puck opens up the laptop, "Whatever! Ms. Berry, got a sec?"

Rachel turns to Kurt and holds up a finger, "Half a moment." She leaves Kurt at the elevator and goes over to Puck. 

"You know," Puck says, "I thought we were having a moment."

"I was having twelve percent of a moment." Puck gives Rachel a look. 

She smiles, but continues, "I dunno, this seems serious. Kurt looks pretty shaken."

"How would you notice- and why is he 'Kurt'?"

Rachel ignores him, and looks towards the computer screen, "What is all this?"

"This is- ah...," Puck grabs the holograms on the laptop and throws them up onto his displays. Holograms fill the room, each is an article on one of the Avengers. We see old footage of Finn fighting in World War 2 next to a graphic of a shield, The Hulk destroying the army in New York, and a blonde man fighting a giant robot next to a graphic of a hammer. "...this!"

They both look upon the screens, observing them.

Rachel let's out a little sigh, "I'm going to take the jet to DC tonight."

Puck turns to her, "Tomorrow."

Rachel looks at him and says, "You have homework." She looks back at the screens, "You have a lot of homework."

"Well, what if I didn't?"

"If you didn't? You mean when you finished?" Puck nods. Rachel smiles, and then adds, "Well, um, then-" She leans in and whispers in Puck's ear. 

Kurt looks to the side, embarrassed.

With a satisfied smirk on his face, Puck nods, and adds, "Square deal. Fly safe."

They kiss for a few moments, while Kurt looks up at the ceiling.

"Work hard." She turns and starts approaching Kurt, "So, any chance you're driving by LaGuardia?"

Kurt nods, "I can drop you off." 

"Fantastic. Ooh, I want to hear about the singer, is that still a thing?"

As they are talking, Puck sees a hologram of the Tesseract. It peaks his interest.

"He moved back to Lima." Kurt says as they enter the elevator.

"What?! Boo!"

Puck picks up the hologram of the Tesseract in his hand. He looks amazed.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adding this next chapter quickly since the next chapter is where the action really starts.

A jet flies over the sea at high-speed. Inside, we see a pilot and co-pilot with Kurt standing behind them. Seated next to Kurt is Finn, watching a video of Blaine as The Hulk.

"So, this Dr. Anderson was trying to replicate the serum they used on me?"

Kurt nods, "A lot of people were. You were the world's first superhero. He thought Gamma radiation might hold the key to unlocking Tanaka's original formula."

Finn continues watching the video, The Hulk attacks the army, and rips apart a tank easily. "Didn't really go his way, did it?"

"Not so much." After a beat, Kurt adds, "When he's not like that, the guy's like a Stephen Hawking." 

At Finn's blank look, Kurt adds on lamely, "He's just a really smart guy." Finn nods. 

"I gotta say - it's an honor to meet you, officially." Finn gives him a small smile, "I sort of met you, I mean, I watched you while you were sleeping." Finn's smile falters a little. "I mean, I was, I was present, while you were unconscious from, uh, the ice."

Finn just gets up and moves over to the cockpit and Kurt follows, looking embarrassed.

"You know it's really - it's just, a, just a huge honor to have you on board."

Finn sighs, "Well, I hope I'm the man for the job."

Kurt nods, "Oh you are, absolutely. We made some modifications to the uniform. I had a little design input." He says this with a little satisfied grin. 

Finn's eyebrows furrow a bit, "The uniform? Aren't the stars and stripes a little...old-fashioned?"

Kurt let's out a little sigh, "Everything that's happening, the things that are about to come to light...people might just need a little old-fashioned."

\----------

We see two soldiers run down a tunnel. They run into the lab where dozens of men are working, including Dr. Howell. Jesse sits and watches, spear in hand. He closes his eyes and concentrates. The tip of the spear glows and he is transported to another world. Terri approaches him.

"The Chitauri grow restless."

"Let them goad themselves. I will lead them in a glorious battle."

Terri laughs, "Battle? Against the meager might of Earth?"

"Glorious, not lengthy - if your force is as formidable as you claim."

Terri sounds shocked, offended, even. "You question us?" With even more disbelief adds, "You question her? She who out the scepter in your hand, who gave you ancient knowledge and new purpose? When you were cast out- defeated!"

"I was a king! The rightful king of Asgard, betrayed."

"Your ambition is little, full of childish need. We look beyond the Earth to greater worlds the Tesseract will unveil."

"You don't have the Tesseract yet."

Terri lunges at Jesse, hissing. But she stops short.

"I don't threaten. But until I open the doors, until your force is mine to command, you are but words."

"You will have your war, Asgardian." Terri starts to circle behind Jesse. 

"If you fail, if the Tesseract is kept from us, there will be no realm, no barren moon, no crevice, where she cannot find you." She gets closer, and her voice gets lower, "You think you know pain? She will make you long for something as sweet as pain." She puts her hand to Jesse's face. With a shout of pain, Jesse is instantly back on Earth. He stares ahead, angry. 

\----------

Back on the jet, it lands on a giant carrier in the water, it's the SHIELD Helicarrier in all its glory. Personnel are walking all over, some are strapping down jets and containers.

Kurt and Finn step out of it. Tina walks toward them.

Kurt sees her and acknowledges her presence to Finn, "Agent Wu - Captain Hudson."

Finn nods towards her, "Ma'am."

"Hi," Tina says and the turns to Kurt. "They need you on the bridge; they're starting the face trace."

Kurt nods, "See you there."

He leaves as Tina and Finn start walking. 

"It was quite the buzz around here, finding you in the ice," Tina says breaking the silence. "I thought Kurt was gonna swoon," she says with a little smirk. 

Finn gives her a small smile and continues walking. 

"Did he ask you to sign his Captain America trading cards yet?"

"Trading cards?" He asks, a bemused tone in his face. 

"They're vintage. He's very proud."

They see Blaine, who isn't quite sure where to go. 

"Dr. Anderson," Finn says, causing Blaine to look up and walk towards him. 

Finn holds his hand out and shakes the man's arm. "Word is you can find the Cube."

Blaine with a little edge in his voice asks, "Is that the only word on me?"

Finn says directly. "Only word I care about."

Blaine relaxes a bit, "It must be strange for you, all of this." He motions his hand out toward the carrier and everything.

They look around and see a bunch of soldiers march by into the ship.  
"Well, this is actually kind of familiar."

Tina, after listening to her comm device, interrupts them. "Gentlemen, you might wanna step inside in a minute. It's gonna get a little hard to breathe."

Over the intercom, they hear, "Flight Mode. Secure the deck."

There is a loud whirring and clunking sound as Blaine and Finn make their way to the edge of the helicarrier.

Finn with a bit of confusion in his voice, "Is this a submarine?"

Blaine slightly scoffs, "Really? They want me in a submerged pressurized metal container?"

They watch as propellers come up out of the water. They begin to spin and the carrier begins to lift into the air.

Blaine let's out a little laugh, "Oh no, this is much worse."

\----------

Finn and Blaine follow Tina inside. She peels away from them as they stare and observe in awe. It's very busy, with SHIELD personnel working at stations, and communicating over earpieces.

"Maximum performance take off, increase output to capacity. Power plant performing at capacity. We are clear." A SHIELD technician says to Santana. 

From the top platform, Santana says, "All engines operating. SHIELD emergency protocol one nine three point six in effect. She turns to Schuester and says, "We're at level, sir."

"Good! Let's vanish."

"Engage retro reflection panels," Santana says to the technician. 

Outside, we see that the underside of the ship appears to become coated with mirrors so it blends in with the sky.

"Reflection panels engaged," the technician announces to Director Schuester. 

Schuester turns to Blaine and Finn, "Gentlemen."

As they come over, Finn slips Will the ten dollars he bet earlier, in regards to nothing being able to surprise him.

Schuester turns to Blaine and says, "Doctor, thank you for coming." He holds out his hand. 

Blaine shakes his hand and says, "Thanks for asking nicely. So, um, how long am I staying?"

"Once we get our hands on the Tesseract, you're in the wind."

"Well, where are you with that?"

Schuester looks to Kurt, who's off to the side, and Kurt answers, "We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones..."

Finn stands in the background confused of what's being said. While Kurt is talking, Tina moves over to a computer screen where we see Mike's face trace in progress. She checks the stats.

"...laptops, if it's connected to a satellite, it's eyes and ears for us."

Tina's wringing her fingers together, anxious to find them, "It's still not gonna find them in time."

Blaine nods and says, "We have to narrow it down." After a beat he adds, "How many spectrometers do you have access to?"

Schuester asks, "How many are there?"

"Call every lab you know. Tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for Gamma rays. I'll come up with some kind of tracking algorithm. At least we could rule out a few places. Do you have somewhere for me to work?"

Schuester looks towards Tina, "Agent Wu, would you show Dr. Anderson to the laboratory, please?"

Tina walks over to Blaine and they begin walking out of the bridge area.  
"You're gonna love it, Doc. We've got all the toys."

As they leave, Will walks up to Santana. "Lopez, did you tell Figgins that Agent Chang had been compromised?"

Santana holds her head up high and says, "Was that not procedure?"

Schuester ignores her question and walks off the bridge and onto the air deck, where he looks out.

After a while, Santana adds, "Did you tell them who exactly is on your response team?"

Schuester looks over his shoulder and says in a low voice, "Doesn't appear that I have to."

\----------

Back underground, Dr. Howell is working on a machine in Jesse's hidden base.

"Put it over there," Carl says to a soldier. He turns to Mike and asks,  
"Where did you find all these people?"

Mike's working on a tablet and doesn't look up when he says, "SHIELD has no shortage of enemies, Doctor." Mike pauses and holds up a tablet with a picture of a rock on it, "This the stuff you need?"

"Yeah. Iridium. It's found in meteorites, it forms anti-protons. It's very hard to get hold of."

"Especially if SHIELD knows you need it."

"Well, I didn't know."

Jesse walks up. Carl turns to greet him, a big smile on his face.

"Hey! This is wonderful. The Tesseract has shown me so much. It's- it's more than knowledge, it's truth."

"I know. It, ah- it touches everyone differently." Jesse turns to Mike, gives him a calculated look, "What did it show you, Agent Chang?"

Without emotion, Mike says, "My next target."

Carl let's out a little laugh, and says to Jesse "Cold-hearted bastard, he's got no soul." He looks back to Mike and says, "No wonder you chose this, this tomb to work in."

In a sarcastic tone, Mike replies, "Well, the Radisson doesn't have three levels of lead lined flooring between SHIELD and that cube."

Carl holds up his hands and walks back to the machine he was working on.

"I see why Schuester chose you to guard it," Jesse says. 

"You're going to have to contend with him, you know." They start walking down away towards a corridor. After a moment, Mike adds, "As long as he's in the air, I can't pin him down. And he'll be putting  
together a team."

"Are they a threat?"

"To each other more than likely. But if Schuester can get 'em on track, and he might, they could throw some noise our way."

"You admire Schuester," Jesse states. 

"He's got a clear line of sight."

"Is that why you failed to kill him?"

Mike stops walking, "It might be. I was disoriented." Jesse turns and gives him a look, "And I'm not at my best with a gun."

"I want to know everything you can tell me about this team of his. I would- test their mettle." Mike nods as Jesse continues, "I am weary of scuttling in shadow. I mean to rule this world, not burrow in it."

"That's a risk."

"Oh yes."

Mike thinks for a moment, "If you're set on making yourself known, I could be useful."

Intrigued, Jesse says, "Tell me what you need."

"I'll need a distraction," Mike says as he walks over to a small case, takes out his bow, and snaps it open. "And an eyeball."


	5. Chapter 5

On the bridge of the helicarrier, as Will commands from the center, Kurt and Finn are standing on the bridge, just waiting. A male agent is in the background running the face trace.

Kurt says a little awkwardly, "I mean, if it's not too much trouble."

Finn looks at him and shakes his head, "No-no, it's fine."

After some silence, Kurt adds on, "It's a vintage set. Took me a couple of years to collect them all. Near mint, slight boxing around the edges but-"

He's interrupted as a computer beeps, "We got a hit. Sixty seven percent match," says a SHIELD technician. As the others start to gather, it beeps again, "Wait- cross-match, seventy nine percent."

Kurt looks glad to have a hit, "Location?"

On the computer Jesse, in a formal wear, walks into a gathering at some kind of museum. 

"Stuttgart, Germany. Twenty eight, Königstraße," The technician answers. 

"Captain, you're up." Schuester says from the command center. 

Finn nods and walks off.

\----------

Outside the gala, cars pull up and drop off fancy guests. Inside, a string quartet is playing in a large ballroom filled with people talking, mingling.

Back on the carrier, Finn walks through a door and in a case is the new and improved Captain America suit. He walks over to it and contemplates it.

At some kind of secure facility, two guards outside are shot down with arrows while securing the building.

A jet is speeding across the cloudy skies, making its way to Germany.

Back at the secure facility, Mike and some men rush over to a door with a scanner on the side. 

They prepare to break in.

\----------

At the gala, Jesse walks down some stairs from a balcony. A young male is at a podium talking. Jesse enters and hits a guard with his scepter, knocking him to the floor. The guests stop and stare in awe. Jesse swiftly grabs the scientist and flips him onto a statue. He then uses a device to bore into his eye. The guests scatter in horror, screaming, running away as Jesse smiles menacingly.

At the secure facility, the image of the eye is transported to a similar device Mike is holding over a retina scanner. It identifies "Arthur Abrams", the man Jesse attacked at the gala. The door opens. Mike strides in and takes a glass tube containing the Iridium.

Back at the gala, people flee, screaming, and Jesse follows, slowly taking on his Asgardian attire. He blasts a Polizei car speeding toward him, flipping it over. He creates duplicates of himself, surrounding a mob of gala people.

Jesse looks towards the crowd and says, "Kneel before me." When no one moves, he moves closer, "I said- KNEEL" He yells while pounding his scepter down on the ground. 

The people hurry, dropping to their knees.

Jesse smirks and starts walking through the crowd, "Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It's the unspoken truth of humanity, that you crave subjugation. The bright lure of freedom diminishes your life's joy in a mad scramble for power, for identity. You were made to be ruled. In the end- you will always kneel."

When he finishes speaking, a German old man before him gets to his feet. 

"Not to men like you," the man says. 

With an insulted look on his face, Jesse answers, "There are no men like me."

With some significance, the man states, "There are always men like you."

"Look to your elder, people. Let him be an example."

Jesse fires his scepter but Finn jumps in front of the man - deflecting the beam off his shield causing it to hit Jesse, who falls to the ground.

"You know, the last time I was in Germany and saw someone standing above everybody else, we ended up disagreeing."

"The soldier," Jesse says venomously as he gets to his feet. "The man out of time."

"I'm not the one who's out of time."

The jet comes in behind him with Tina inside. A gun unfolds from the underside of the plane.

Over the speaker, Tina commands, "Jesse, drop the weapon and stand down."

Jesse pauses, then fires at the jet and it banks hard to avoid it.

Finn throws his shield at Jesse, catching it on the ricochet. He attacks Jesse and the two fight. After a few blows, Finn backs away and tries the shield again. Jesse knocks it to the side and knocks Finn down when he comes after him. He forces Finn down with the scepter.

"Kneel!"

Finn pushes the scepter off his head and says, "Not today!"

Finn jumps up and does a spin-kick to Jesse's face. The two continue to fight.

In the cockpit of the jet, Tina is trying to figure out how to take a shot.

"Guy's all over the place," Tina says to the co-pilot. 

Over her earpiece, she's hears Puck's voice. "Agent Wu, you miss me?"

The computer screen shows the message 'PA SYSTEMS OVERRIDE', and AC/DC's, 'Shoot to Thrill' begins to play. 

Tina let's out a little sigh before a slight smirk forms across her face. 

Puck, in the Iron Man suit, flies down and fires a repulsor blast, knocking Jesse down. He readies a bunch of missiles to fire at him.

"Make a move, Reindeer Games." Puck says with some snark. 

Jesse's Asgardian garb fades away and he raises his hands in surrender.

"Good move," Puck says, as he stows the missiles away, and lowers his arms. 

Finn walks over to him, as the jet begins to land in the background. "Mister Puckerman."

"Captain."

\----------

The jet zips by, back to the helicarrier.

Inside, Tina is piloting the plane. Jesse is strapped down in the back of the plane. Finn, in the suit but no cowl, and Puck, in the suit but without the helmet, are standing behind the cockpit and talking.

Over Tina's headset, Schuester's talking to her. "He saying anything?"

Quietly, Tina answers, "Not a word."

"Just get him here, we're low on time," Schuester orders. 

Finn sighs, and looks at Puck, "I don't like it."

"What? Rock of Ages giving up so easily?"

"I don't remember it being that easy. He sure packs a wallop."

"Still, you were pretty spry, for an older fellow," Puck says with a little smirk. "What's your thing? Pilates?"

Finn gives him a look of confusion and says, "What?"

"It's like calisthenics. You might have missed a couple of things. Y'know, doing time as a Capsicle."

With annoyance in his voice, Finn says,  
"Schuester didn't tell me he was calling you in."

"Yeah, there's a lot of things he doesn't tell you."

Out of nowhere, there's a flash of lightning and a roar of thunder.

With her eyebrows furrowed, Tina looks out the window and says, "Where's this coming from?"

Jesse leans forward, looking around.

Finn looks to Jesse and says, "What's the matter? Scared of a little lightning?"

Jesse says, dryly, "I'm not overly fond of what follows."

Jesse looks to the sky. There's a crash on top of the jet. Something has landed. Puck, Finn, and Tina look up. They're all surprised.

Outside, there seems to be a shadowy figure holding onto the jet. We make it out - this is Samuel Evans, God of Thunder, in his royal silver armor and red cape. His blonde hair blowing behind him, with a deadly serious look on his face. There's another flash of light.

Inside, Tina speeds up. Finn turns around and pulls his cowl back on his face, while Puck grabs his helmet which attaches itself to the suit. Puck pushes a button and opens the ramp of the jet.

"What are you doing?" Finn asks. 

Sam enters, jumping down on the ramp. Puck raises a hand for a repulsor blast, but Sam hits him away with his hammer, causing him to fall on Finn. Sam grabs Jesse by the neck and, after swinging his hammer, jumps out of the plane.

Puck groans as he gets to his feet, "Great. Now there's that guy."

From the cockpit, Tina yells, "Another Asgardian?"

Finn yells over the wind, "Think he's a friendly?"

"Doesn't matter. If he frees Jesse, or kills him, the Tesseract's lost," He says as he begins walking to the edge of the ramp.

"Puck, we need a plan of attack."

"I have a plan." He turns to look at him, "Attack!"

Iron Man flies out of the jet and Finn huffs in annoyance before reaching for a parachute.

Tina's pressing some buttons, when she turns her head towards him and says, "I'd sit this one out, Cap."

"I don't see how I can," Finn says as he puts on  
the parachute. 

"These guys come from legend, they're basically gods."

"There's only one God, ma'am, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't dress like that."

Finn finishes fastening on the chute, grabs his shield, and dives out the plane, head first.

\----------

Up in the mountains, Sam and Jesse crash down on a cliff. Sam throws Jesse to the ground, he groans, before he let's out a laugh. 

Sam narrows his eyes, and says, "Where is the Tesseract?"

With pain in his voice, Jesse says, "Oh-ho, I missed you too."

With his voice raised, Sam says, "Do I look to be in a gaming mood?"

Jesse slowly gets to his feet, and states, "Oh, you should thank me. If I hadn't opened the portal and come here, you never would have known I was coming to your precious Earth."

Sam drops his hammer and pulls Jesse to his feet.

Sam looks at him, and says softly, "I thought you dead."

"Did you mourn?"

"We all did. Our father-"

Angrily, Jesse cuts him off, "YOUR father. He did tell you my true parentage, did he not?" He escapes Sam's grip and walks a few steps away. 

Sam follows and says, "We were raised together, we played together, we fought together. Do you remember none of that?"

Jesse turns sharply, "I remember a shadow, living in the shade of your greatness. I remember you tossing me into an abyss. I who was and should be king!"

"So you take the world I love as recompense for your imagined slights? No. The Earth is under my protection, Jesse."

Jesse laughs, sarcasm evident, "And you're doing a marvelous job with that. The humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly fret. I mean to rule them! And why should I not?"

Sam shakes his head and asks, "You think yourself above them?"

"Well yes," Jesse says simply. 

"Then you miss the truth of ruling, brother. The throne would suit you ill."

Jesse pushes past Sam and walks away, Sam follows.

With rage in his voice, Jesse says, "I've seen worlds you've never known about. I have grown, SAMUEL, in my exile." Sam twitches at hearing the contempt in his voice when he says his name. "I have seen the true power of the Tesseract, and when I wield it-"

Sam interrupts him, "Who showed you this power? Who controls the would-be-king?"

Jesse yells, "I am a king!"

Sam grabs him by his armor and yells, "Not here! You give up the Tesseract; you give up this poisonous dream!" He brings one hand to Jesse's face, forcing him to look at him, as he softly adds, "You come home."

Jesse lets out a shaky breath and says, "...I don't have it."

Sam steps back, summons his hammer and holds it ready.

Jesse shrugs slightly, "You need the cube to bring me home, but I've sent it off I know not where."

Sam holds his hammer in front of Jesse's face, and starts to say, "You listen well brother-"

He's interrupted as Iron Man flies in, tackling him off the mountain. 

Jesse stands waiting. "I'm listening?"

\----------

Some distance away, Sam and Iron Man crash through the trees to the ground. Puck lifts his faceplate.

Sam gets up and says angrily, "Do not touch me again."

"Then don't take my stuff," Puck says simply. 

Aggravated, Sam states, "You have no idea what you're dealing with."

Puck looks around and says, "Uh- Shakespeare in the park?" He makes a dramatic arm motion, and in a fake British accent, he says, "Doth mother know you wear-eth her drapes?"

"This is beyond you, metal man. Jesse will face Asgardian justice."

"He gives up the cube, he's all yours. Until then-," His faceplate drops down, "Stay out of the way." He turns and scoffs, "Tourist."

Sam rears back and throws the hammer, hitting Iron Man square in the chest, sending him flying, landing on his back.

Inside his helmet, Puck glares and says, "Okay!"

Jesse smirks from the cliff top as Sam summons the hammer back, then swings it in circles, preparing to fly. Iron Man gets to his feet and fires a repulsor blast at Sam, then flies at him, kicking him through a tree.

Sam stands again, raising the hammer to the sky. He summons a bolt of lightning as Jesse watches in the distance. Sam sends the bolt at Iron Man. It zaps him, hard, and Puck shakes his head, disoriented.

JARVIS' voice comes over Puck's helmet,  
"Power at four hundred percent capacity."

Puck let's out a little huff, "How bout that?"

Iron Man fires a more powerful blast at Sam. He gets to his feet again. The two stand ready then fly at each other, Puck winning as he flies them toward a cliff. But, as he drags Sam up the cliff face, Sam gets his feet under him and kicks off, sending the two of them smashing through the trees and crashing to the forest grounds.

Sam and Iron Man stand quickly. Sam sends in a left hook so Iron Man is about to punch but Sam grabs his fist. Iron Man is about to send in his left hook and Sam grabs that too. Sam begins to crush Iron Man's right gauntlet with ease. Inside the helmet, Puck looks at the HUD which is alerting him to the damage. He groans and thinks.

Iron Man lifts his palm, that is being crushed, and he fires a blast at Sam's face - it does nothing to Sam so he head butts him. Sam headbutts him back. Iron Man flies back, coming to a stop before launching himself at Sam. Iron Man throws Sam into a broken tree. Sam then stands and the two go at it for a bit longer - a fist fight.

Sam summons his hammer about to slam down on the chest of Puck but he suddenly shoots off, causing Sam to fall forward. Behind the rising Sam, Iron Man swoops in and punches him.

They get ready to sends blows at each other until Finn's shield ricochets off both their chests.

"Hey!" Finn catches his shield, "That's enough!"

He jumps down of the tree and approaches Sam and Iron Man.

Finn turns to Sam and says, "Now I don't know what you plan on doing here-"

Sam interrupts him, and says with his voice raised, "I've come here to put an end to Jesse's schemes!"

"Then prove it. Put that hammer down."

Puck turns to Finn and says, "Uh, yeah! No! Bad call, he loves his hammer-"

Sam swings his hammer back, sending Iron Man to the ground behind him. He then faces Finn.

"You want me to put the hammer down?!" Sam says, threateningly. 

Sam leaps, swinging the hammer overhead. Finn raises the shield over his head. When the two connect there is a loud boom and a flash of light. The two are thrown backwards. A huge section of the forest has been flattened. All three slowly get to their feet and come together.

"Are we done here?"

Sam looks around, resigned.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay, but work's been hectic. Updates should be a little more regular from now on.

The helicarrier flies through the clouds. Inside, Jesse walks down the halls, escorted by a group of armed guards. 

He walks past a window - the lab, where Blaine is working. He looks up as the guards walks past. Jesse smiles through the window at him. Blaine removes his glasses and rubs his temples.

\----------

Jesse stands inside a cylindrical glass cage, the door closes and locks him inside. 

Schuester walks over to a control panel nearby.

Jesse turns and looks at him, smirking.

"In case it's unclear, you try to escape, you so much as scratch that glass-," Will pushes a button and the floor beneath the cell opens up to nothing, the wind screams. "Thirty thousand feet straight down in a steel trap. You get how that works?"

He pushes a button and closes the floor. He gestures first to Jesse, "Ant." Then gestures to panel, "Boot."

Jesse's smirk grows even wider. "It's an impressive cage. Not built, I think, for me."

"Built for something much more stronger than you."

"Oh, I've heard," Jesse turns to a camera that's focused on the cell. 

Out on a conference table near the bridge, on the glass table, a monitor is up - Jesse is on it, Tina is watching the feed. Sam observing intently with arms crossed, as well as an unmasked Finn, and Blaine, who's leaning against the table. 

"The mindless beast," Tina raises her eyes towards Blaine. Blaine lowers his eyes when he hears Jesse continue. "He who still thinks himself a man."

Jesse looks back towards Schuester, "How desperate are you, that you would call upon such lost creatures to defend you?"

Schuester moves toward the cage slowly, "How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war, you steal a force you can't hope to control, you talk about peace, and you kill 'cause it's fun." He lowers his voice and says in a serious tone, "You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did."

In a mocking tone, Jesse says, "Ooh. It burns you to have come so close, to have the Tesseract, to have power- unlimited power- and for what?" He smiles and faces the camera. 

On the main bridge, Santana is watching the live feed with scrutiny. Arms crossed and standing like she's ready for a fight, she keeps watching as Jesse continues speaking. 

"A warm light for all mankind to share?" Jesse says directly into the camera. He turns toward Schuester as he continues, "And then to be reminded what real power is."

Scuester lets out a little huff and starts walking away, "Well, let me know if 'real power' wants a magazine or something."

\----------

Back at the conference table, the monitor on Finn's side of the table turns off. 

Blaine, who was looking over Finn's shoulder to watch the footage, breaks the silence, "He really grows on you, doesn't he?"

Finn ignored his comment and says, "Jesse's gonna drag this out. So, Sam, what's his play?

Sam uncrosses his arms and answers, "He has an army called the Chitauri. They're not of Asgard nor any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth, in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract.

With a sigh, Finn repeats, "An army, from outer space?"

"So, he's building another portal. That's what he needs Carl Howell for," Blaine says while playing with his glasses. 

Sam looks towards Blaine, "Howell?"

"He's an astrophysicist," Blaine answers. 

With his brows furrowed, Sam corrects him, "He's a friend."

Tina turns toward Sam and informs him, "Jesse has them under some kind of spell." She averts her eyes before she continues, "Along with one of ours."

Finn speaks up from his end of the table, "I wanna know why Jesse let us take him. He's not leading an army from here."

"I don't think we should all be focusing on Jesse. The guy's brain is a bag full if cats, you can smell crazy on him," Blaine says while pacing. 

Sam's eyes narrow, and he says with an edge to his voice, "Have care how you speak. Jesse is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard, and he is my brother.

Tina speaks to diffuse the situation, "He's killed eighty people in two days."

Sam quietly, "He's adopted."

"I think it's about the mechanics. Iridium, what do they need the Iridium for?" Blaine says, thinking aloud. 

"It's a stabilizing agent!" Pucks says walking onto the bridge with Kurt. 

Puck turns to Kurt, and says softly, "I'm just saying, take a weekend; I'll fly you to Lima. Keep love alive." Kurt, with a little smirk on his face, gives him a nod and peels from Puck as he walks deeper into the room. 

Speaking to everyone, Puck continues, "Means the portal won't collapse on itself like it did at SHIELD." As he gets closer to Sam, he raises his hands, and with a pat on Sam's bicep says, "No hard feelings, Point Break, you got a mean swing." 

Sam gives Puck a look as he walks towards the control panels. 

Puck continues, "Also, means the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Jesse wants."

Reaching the bridge, Puck speaks to the SHIELD personnel as if he was the commander. "Ah, raise the mizzen mast, jib the topsails." The personnel look at him strangely. He points into the crowd, "That man is playing Galaga! Thought we wouldn't notice, but we did."

Puck pauses, he covers one eye and looks around, speaking to Santana nearby. "How does Schuester even see these?" Puck motions towards the computer screens. 

With annoyance in her voice, Santana replies, "He turns."

"Sounds exhausting!" Puck says as he starts messing with the screens. "The rest of the raw materials, Chang can get his hands on pretty easily. Only major component he still needs is a power source of high energy density." He reaches under one of the screens and places a button-sized device there. "Something to kick start the Cube."

"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?" Santana asks with disbelief in her voice. 

With sass, Puck says with a fake smile, "Last night." He looks towards everyone else and as he notices their looks of disbelief, he explains himself. "The packet, Dr. Howell's notes, the extraction theory papers," With a little bit of sarcasm, "Am I the only one who did the reading?"

Finn thinks for a moment before he asks, "Does Jesse need any particular kind of power source?"

Blaine speaks up, "He'd have to heat the Cube to a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier."

Puck nods and walks toward him, "Unless Howell has figured out how to stabilize the Quantum Tunneling effect."

"Well, if he could do that, all he'd really need is a nuclear reactor to reach heavy ion fusion."

"Finally. Someone who speaks English," Puck says and reaches out to shake Blaine's hand.

Finn, who was entirely lost during their exchange, turns to the others and says softly, "Is that what just happened?"

Puck lets go of Blaine's hand and says, "It's good to meet you, Dr. Anderson. Your work on antielectron collisions was unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster."

Blaine purses his lips, and with a little embarrassment says, "Thanks."

Schuester enters the bridge and informs Puck, "Dr. Anderson is only here to track the Cube. I was hoping you might join him."

Finn turns to Schuester, "I'd start with that stick of his. It may be magical but it works an awful lot like a HYDRA weapon."

"I don't know about that, but it is powered by the Cube. And I'd like to know how Jesse used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys."

Sam has a look of confusion on his face, "Monkeys? I do not understand-"

He's cut off by Finn, "I do!"

The entire room goes silent, and stares at Finn. Blaine has a bemused look in his face, while Puck rolls his eyes. 

Finn looks pleased, although slightly embarrassed from his enthusiasm, "I just... I understood that reference."

After a few more moments of silence, Puck turns to Blaine, "So, shall we play, Doctor?"

Blaine gives him a slight nod, "This way."

As the two men walk off, and everyone gets back to work, a SHIELD tech looks over his shoulder before he switches screens and continues playing Galaga.

\----------

In the lab, Puck and Blaine are working on tracking the Cube. Puck is going over levels on a computer screen, while Blaine's scanning the scepter with a device.

"The Gamma readings are definitely consistent with Howell's reports on the Tesseract. But it's gonna take a while to process."

Puck nods while continuing to make adjustments on the screen. He finishes, and walks toward Blaine, "You know, you should come by Puckerman Tower some time. Top ten floors are R&D, you'd love it; it's candyland."

Blaine smiles gently, "Thanks, but last time I was in New York I kind of broke...Harlem." He lowers his head a bit, slightly embarrassed. 

Puck nods, "Well, I promise a stress free environment. No tension, no surprises," He zaps Blaine in the side with a piece of equipment.

"Ow!" Blaine turns to look at him, while Puck just narrows his eyes and watches him intently.

"Really, nothing?" Puck sounds incredulous. 

Finn, seeing Puck's prank, "Hey! Are you nuts?"

Puck turns to Finn, "Jury's still out!" He turns back toward Blaine, "You really have got a lid on it, haven't you? What's your secret? Mellow jazz, bongo drums, huge bag of weed?" He says the last part with a little grin on his face. 

Finn breathes through his nose, trying to stay calm, "Is everything a joke to you?"

"Funny things are."

"Threatening the safety of everyone on this ship isn't funny," Finn turns to Blaine, "No offense."

Blaine shakes his head, "No, it's alright. I wouldn't have come aboard if I couldn't handle pointy things."

"You're tip-toeing, big man. You need to strut," Puck says to Blaine. 

"And you need to focus on the problem at hand, Puck," Finn says with a bit of edge in his voice. 

"You think I'm not?" Puck says, with all humor leaving his voice. "Why did Will call us in? Why now, why not before? What isn't he telling us?" Puck says while opening up a bag of blueberries. "I can't do the equation unless I have all the variables," he pops some berries into his mouth casually. 

Finn furrows his brow, "You think Schuester's hiding something?"

"He's a spy, Captain. He's _the_ spy. His secrets have secrets," He gestures to Blaine, "It's bugging him too, isn't it?"

Blaine looks up, and stammers a bit, "Uh, ah, I just wanna finish my work here and-"

Finn interrupts him, "Blaine?"

After a pause, Blaine removes his glasses, "'A warm light for all mankind,' Jesse's jab at Schuester about the Cube."

Finn gives him a little nod, "I heard it."

Blaine turns to Puck, "Well, I think that was aimed at you." Puck offers the bag of berries to him, which he accepts, and then continues, "Even if Chang didn't tell Jesse about the tower, it's still all over the news."

"The Puckerman Tower?" Finn clarifies. "That big ugly-" Puck gives him a look, which causes him to pause a bit. "-building in New York?"

Blaine continues, "It's powered by an arc reactor, self-sustaining energy source. That building will run itself for, what, a year?" The last part directed towards Puck. 

Puck nods while throwing some more berries in his mouth, "It's just the prototype." He turns to Finn and elaborates, "I'm kind of the only name in clean energy right now, that's what he's getting at."

"So, why didn't SHIELD bring him in on the Tesseract project?" Blaine wonders aloud, "What are they even doing in the energy business in the first place?"

"I should probably look into that...as soon as my decryption program finishes breaking into all of SHIELD's secure files," Puck says as he pulls out his phone and looks at the status. 

Finn gives him an appalled look, "I'm sorry, did you say-"

Puck cuts him off, "JARVIS has been running it since I hit the bridge." He puts his phone away and looks slightly pleased with himself, "In a few hours I'll know every dirty secret SHIELD has ever tried to hide."

Finn narrows his eyes, "Yet you're confused about why they didn't want you around."

"An intelligence organization that fears intelligence? Historically, not awesome," Puck states. 

"I think Jesse's trying to wind us up. This is a man who means to start a war and if we don't stay focused, he'll succeed." Finn looks at them both and says sternly, "We have orders, we should follow them."

"Following's not really my style," Puck says with a nonchalant shrug. 

Finn shoots him a subtle glare, "And you're all about style, aren't you?"

With quick wit, Puck says, "Out of the people in this room, which one is A: wearing a spangly outfit and B: not of use?"

Blaine picks up the tension between the two of them, and tries to diffuse it, "Finn, tell me none of this smells a little funky to you?"

Finn thinks for a bit, but lets out a sigh, "Just find the Cube."

Finn exits the lab, and when the door closes, he pauses and turns, walking off in another direction. The other two resume their work.

Puck turns to Blaine, "That's the guy my dad never shut up about? Wondering if they shouldn't have kept him on ice."

"Guy's not wrong about Jesse, he does have the jump on us," Blaine says walking to a computer screen. 

"What he's got is an ACME dynamite kit. It's gonna blow up in his face, and I'm gonna be there when it does."

Blaine smiles while fiddling with the computer, "And I'll read all about it."

Puck calls out from his computer screen, "Mmhmm, or, you'll be suiting up with the rest of us."

Blaine shakes his head, "Now, you see I don't get a suit of armor. I'm exposed, like a nerve, it's a nightmare."

"You know, I've got a cluster of shrapnel fighting and inching it's way towards my heart. This stops it," he taps the arc reactor. "This little circle of light. It's part of me now, not just armor. It's a terrible privilege."

"But you can control it," Blaine points out. 

"Because I learned how," Puck counters. 

Blaine shakes his head, "It's different."

Puck walks over to Blaine's screen, and with a wave of his hand, wipes the screen clean. 

With sincerity in his voice, Puck states, "Hey, I read all about your accident. That much Gamma exposure should've killed you."

"So you're saying that the Hulk," Blaine realizing his slip, backtracks, "The Other Guy saved my life?" With a little defense in his voice, continues, "That's nice. That's a nice sentiment. Saved it for what?"

Puck shrugs, "I guess we'll find out."

"You may not enjoy that," says Blaine, the edge from his voice gone. 

"And you just might," Puck says, his voice light. 

The two men share a look before they get back to their work. 

\----------

Elsewhere in the ship, after several seconds, the entrance to a storage room is forced open. Finn walks in, looking around for something.

He hears muffled voices, and quickly jumps to the second floor, latching on to a handrail, and continuing his search. 

\----------

Inside a truck driving along into a tunnel, Carl places the iridium into a device by the Tesseract. As it begins to glow, he smiles.


	7. Chapter 7

Kurt walks over to Sam, who's standing at a window looking contemplative. "Everything all right?"

Sam let's out a sigh, "It's no accident, Jesse taking Carl. I dread what he plans for him once he's done. Carl is a good man.

In a compassionate tone, Kurt tries to ease his worry, "He talks about you a lot. You changed his life. You changed everything around here."

They begin a short walk around the bridge, "They were better as they were. We pretend on Asgard that we're more advanced, but we- we come here battling like Bildschneip."

Kurt stops, confused, "Like what?"

"Bildschneip," Sam repeats. He starts gesturing with his hands, "You know, huge, scaly, big antlers. You don't have those?"

Kurt shakes his head, "No."

Sam looks a bit surprised, but continues, "Huh! Well they are repulsive, and they trample everything in their path." He turns back to the large window, "When I first came to earth, Jesse's rage followed me here, and your people paid the price. And now again. In my youth I courted war."

Schuester approaches them, "War hasn't started yet." When he stops, he gives Sam a serious look, "You think you can make Jesse tell us where the Tesseract is?"

A sigh leaves Sam's mouth, "I do not know. Jesse's mind is pretty far gone, it's not just power he craves, it's vengeance upon me. There's nothing that would take that away from him."

"A lot of people think that, until the pain starts."

Sam levels Schuester with a serious look, "What are you asking me to do?"

Just as serious, he counters, "I'm asking, what are you prepared to do?"

"Jesse is a prisoner."

"Then why do I feel like he's the only person on this boat that wants to be here?"

\----------

Back in the prisoner cage, Jesse is pacing in his cell. Suddenly, he stops. 

"Hmm. There's not many people that can sneak up on me." He turns around to see Tina standing there.

"But you figured I'd come," Tina finishes his thought. 

"After. After whatever tortures Schuester can concoct, you would appear as a friend, as a balm. And I would cooperate."

Getting straight to the point, Tina continues, "I wanna know what you've done to Agent Chang."

"I'd say I've expanded his mind," Jesse says simply. 

Tina starts walking closer towards the cell and crosses her arms, "And once you've won. Once you're king of the mountain. What happens to his mind?"

Jesse raises an eyebrow and with a small smile upon his face, asks, "Is this love, Agent Wu?"

Almost like a reflex, she answers, "Love is for children. I owe him a debt."

Jesse turns to go sit down and with a gesture of his hand, says, "Tell me."

Tina turns and sits on a chair outside of the cell before she begins, "Before I worked for SHIELD, I uh, well, I made a name for myself. I have a very specific skill set. I didn't care who I used it for, or on. I got on the SHIELD's radar in a bad way. Agent Chang was sent to kill me, he made a different call."

"And what will you do if I vow to spare him?"

Quickly, Tina says, "Not let you out."

Jesse lets out a huff of laughter, "Ah, no, but I like this. Your world in the balance, and you bargain for one man?"

"Regimes fall everyday," Tina says with a small shrug, "I tend not to weep over that."

"Even now?"

Tina stands and walks closer to the cell, "It's really not that complicated. I've got red in my ledger, I'd like to wipe it out."

"Can you? Can you wipe out that much red? Sao Paulo? Drakov's daughter? The hospital fire?" Jesse stands and sees that his words have affected the Black Widow. She's gone stoic, and he continues, "Agent Chang told me everything. Your ledger is gushing, it is bleeding red, and you think saving a man no more virtuous than yourself will change anything? This is the basest sentimentality. This is a child's prayer. Pathetic!"

Back in the lab. Puck and Blaine stare at a screen that reads "ACCESS GRANTED." Files begin to open.

Jesse continues, "You lie and kill in the service of liars and killers."

On the bridge, Santana runs over to a SHIELD agent's computer. A message flashes up on the screen "VIRUS DETECTED." Schuester walks over and Santana looks up at him.

"You pretend to be separate, to have your own code..."

In a storage room, Finn opens a container and in it is HYDRA weapons and equipment.

"...something that makes up for the horrors. But they are a part of you, and they will never go away."

Jesse slams his fist against the glass, causing Tina to jump back, "I won't touch Chang! Not until I make him kill you. Slowly, intimately, in every way he knows you fear." Tina's face becomes twisted in anguish, scared out of her mind. "And then he'll wake just long enough to see his good work," Tina turns away from Jesse in horror, "And when he screams I'll split his skull! This is my bargain, you mewling quim!"

Tina's head hangs low, her shoulders shaking, and she says in a broken voice, "You're a monster!"

Jesse grins menacingly, "Oh, no. You brought the monster."

Tina suddenly lifts her head and turns to face Jesse - her face is dry. She realizes, "So, Anderson? That's your play."

Jesse has a look of confusion across his face, "What?"

Tina begins to exit the room. She activates her comm device and says, "Jesse means to unleash the Hulk. Keep Anderson in the lab, I'm on my way. Send Sam as well." She stops and faces Jesse, "Thank you, for your cooperation!"

Tina quickly strides off as Jesse looks bewildered.

\----------

Back in the lab. Puck and Blaine are reading a computer screen. Schuester enters, "What are you doing, Mr. Puckerman?

Puck looks towards him, "Uh- kind of been wondering the same thing about you."

"You're supposed to be locating the Tesseract."

"We are, the model's locked and we're sweeping for the signature now. When we get a hit, we'll have the location within half a mile," Blaine says, and points to a computer screen across the room. 

"And you'll get your cube back, no muss, no fuss," Puck says and looks back at the computer in front of him, and asks, "What is Phase Two?"

Finn enters, and slams a large HYDRA gun on the table, "Phase Two is SHIELD uses the Cube to make weapons." He looks at Puck, "Sorry, computer was moving a little slow for me."

Schuester turns towards Finn, "Finn, we gathered everything related to the Tesseract. This does not mean that we're-"

Puck cuts him off, "I'm sorry, Will." Puck turns the screen towards Schuester. It shows a plan for some missile, "What were you lying?"

Finn looks towards Schuester, "I was wrong, Director. The world hasn't changed a bit."

Sam and Tina enter. Blaine looks towards her, "Did you know about this?"

Tina notices his tone, "You want to think about removing yourself from this environment, doctor?"

Blaine laughs, "Oh, I was in Calcutta. I was plenty removed from this environment."

Tina warns him, "Jesse's manipulating you."

Blaine says, with an edge to his voice, "And you've been doing what exactly?"

Just as hard, Tina replies, "You didn't come here because I bat my eyelashes at you."

"Yes, and I'm not leaving because suddenly you get a little twitchy. I'd like to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to build weapons of mass destruction."

After a pause, Schuester points at Sam, "Because of him."

Sam's brows furrow, "Me?"

Schuester continues, "Last year earth had a visitor from another planet who had a grudge match that leveled a small town. We learned that not only are we not alone, but we are hopelessly, hilariously, out-gunned."

"My people want nothing but peace with your planet," Sam reiterates.

"But you're not the only people out there, are you? And, you're not the only threat. The world's filling up with people who can't be matched, they can't be controlled."

Finn speaks up, sharply, "Like you controlled the cube!"

"Your work with the Tesseract is what drew Jesse to it, and his allies. It is the signal to all the realms that the earth is ready for a higher form of war," Sam explains to Schuester and Finn. 

Finn questions, "A higher form?!"

Schuester defends SHIELD's actions, "You forced our hand! We had to come up with some kind of-"

Puck cuts him off, "Nuclear deterrent! 'Cause that always calms everything right down."

Schuester turns towards him, "Remind me again how you made your millions, Puck." 

Finn looks towards Schuester, "I'm sure if he still made weapons, Puck would be neck deep-"

Puck cuts him off and says with a hard tone. "Wait-Wait! Hold on! How is this now about me?"

Finn snaps, "I'm sorry, isn't everything?"

Sam speaks over them, "I thought humans were more evolved than this."

Everyone begins arguing over each other.

Schuester turns towards him, "Excuse me, did we come to your planet and blow stuff up?"

Sam replies proudly, "I am Earth's champion."

"You're not my champion!" Schuester cuts in quickly. 

Tina looks at the two of them, "Are you guys really that naive? SHIELD monitors potential threats."

Puck looks at Sam and Finn, and says, "You furious? I'm furious."

Schuester looks towards Puck, "That's not your concern!"

Blaine makes a face, and says to Tina, "And Captain America is a threat?"

She turns to Blaine, and says, "We all are!"

As they argue over one another, we see the scepter glow strongly behind them.

Puck turns to Finn, "You're on that list? Are you above or below angry bees?"

Finn almost growls and says, "I swear to God, Puck, one more crack..."

Puck cuts him off, "Is that a threat? Verbal threat! I feel threatened!"

Finn yells, "Show some respect!"

"Respect what!" Puck says with derision. 

\----------

In the interior of a jet approaching the helicarrier, a screen in the jet is Jesse's scepter. Inside men working for Jesse put on masks and load weapons. Mike readies his bow.

SHIELD Technician over the radio speaks, "Transport six-six-five-oh. Please relay your form code. Got you on the computer but not on the data log. What is your haul? Over."

The pilot responds, "Arms and ammunition. Over."

\----------

Back in the lab, with everyone still arguing.

Sam's speaking to Schuester, "You speak of control, yet you court chaos!"

Blaine speaks up, "It's their MO, isn't it? I mean, what are we, a team? No, no, no. We're a chemical mixture that makes chaos. We're- we're a time bomb."

Schuester turns and says to him in a tone not meant to argue, "You need to step away."

"Why shouldn't the guy let off a little steam?" Puck says, as he places his hand on Finn's shoulder. 

Finn pushes his hand off, and says strongly, "You know damn well why! Back off!"

Puck smiles, and says threateningly, "Oh, I'm starting to want you to make me."

Finn steps closer, "Yeah, big man in a suit of armor. Take that off, what are you?"

Coolly, Puck says, "Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist."

"I know guys with none of that worth ten of you. I've seen the footage. The only thing you really fight for is yourself. You're not the guy to make the sacrifice play, to lay down on a wire and let the other guy crawl over you."

Puck says quickly, "I think I would just cut the wire."

Finn smirks, "Always a way out." He shakes his head a bit and says seriously, "You know, you may not be a threat, but you better stop pretending to be a hero."

Puck scoffs, "A hero, like you? You're a laboratory experiment, Hudson. Everything special about you came out of a bottle."

\----------

Back to the jet, the ramp opens and Mike nocks an arrow, takes aim and lets it loose. The arrow swings in the air and attaches to the side of one of the carrier's enormous engines, flashing.

\----------

Back in the lab, tensions are still high.

Finn smirks, "Put on the suit, let's go a few rounds."

Sam laughs, "You people are so petty, and tiny."

Bitterly, Blaine says, "Yeah, this is a team."

Schuester turns towards Tina, "Agent Wu, would you escort Blaine back to his-"

"Where?" Blaine cuts him off, "You rented out my room!"

Trying to calm Blaine down, Schuester says, "The cell was just-"

Blaine cuts him off again, "In case you needed to kill me. But you can't, I know, I tried!" He stops and sees everyone is staring at him. He continues, "I got low. I didn't see an end so I put a bullet in my mouth and the other guy spit it out. So I moved on, I focused on helping other people." Blaine slowly backs away, "I was good until you dragged me back into this freak show and put everyone here at risk." He turns and looks at Tina, and in a low, threatening voice, "You wanna know my secret, Agent Wu? You wanna know how I stay calm?"

Everyone is watching Blaine, Will and Tina reach for their guns.

Finn speaks up, "Dr. Anderson." Blaine looks at him, "Put down the scepter."

Blaine looks down, surprised, to see the spear in his hand. The monitor makes a noise, signaling the Tesseract has been located, and Blaine looks towards the noise. 

Schuester says, "Got it!"

Blaine, as he puts the scepter back on the table, says, "Sorry, kids. You don't get to see my party trick after all." He walks over to the screen on the other side of the room. 

"You've located the Tesseract?" Sam asks. 

Puck says, "I can get there faster."

Finn cuts in, "Look, all of us-"

Sam speaks over him, "The Tesseract belongs on Asgard, no human is a match for it."

Puck turns to leave and Finn holds him back, "You're not going alone!"

Puck smacks his hand away, "You gonna stop me?"

"Put on the suit, let's find out!"

"I'm not afraid to hit an old man."

Finn says lowly, "Put on the suit."

Blaine sees something on the monitor, "Oh my god."

\----------

Back to the jet, Mike kneels down and presses a button on his bow. The arrow head explodes. The blast destroys one of the engines in a huge explosion.

\----------

Back in the lab, everyone in the lab goes flying in different directions. Will and Sam fall to the ground behind the table. Puck and Finn are blown to the entry way. Blaine and Tina fly out of the lab and into the lower equipment room.

Outside, huge pieces of flaming debris fall to earth, and then alarms begin to ring.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I need to stop promising quicker updates, I just end up jinxing myself.
> 
> But to make up for this delay, this chapter is huge. I wanted to split it up, but it didn't really flow, so here it is. Enjoy.

The lab's in ruins after the explosion. Finn and Puck scramble to their feet. Finn turns to him, "Put on the suit."

Puck nods quickly, "Yep."

Finn helps Puck up and out of the lab, and onto the bridge. People are running around, yelling and grabbing guns while the monitors are beeping wildly. SHIELD techs are panicking. SHIELD Agents are gearing up and running to their stations. The whole place is hectic.

\----------

Back in the lab, Schuester sits up, groaning. He activates his comm device, "Lopez!"

Back on the bridge, Santana is standing at her command area. She is looking at a screen, "Number Three engine is down."

A SHIELD tech speaks up from the pit, "We've been hit!"

Santana runs over to the bridge tech's station, "Did we get a run in? Talk to me."

"We've got a fire in Engine Three. The line looks mostly in tact but it's impossible to get out there to make repairs while we're in the air," the tech explains while gesturing to the screen. 

"We lose one more engine, we won't be," Santana sighs. She speaks to Schuester through her comm, "Somebody's gotta get outside and patch that engine."

Back in the lab, Schuester groans again before talking to Puck, "Puckerman, you copy that?"

Puck speaks up over the earpiece, "I'm on it."

Kurt's on the bridge when he hears Schuester over his device, "Hummel, initiate defensive lock down in the contingent center. Then get to the armory. Wu!"

In the equipment room, Tina's leg is trapped under a very large pipe. She tries pulling herself free. She groans in pain when she can't get free. Blaine is in the corner spazzing out, he is fine but he is making very wired moments.

She speaks into her earpiece, "Okay!"

She looks over to Blaine, who is breathing heavy, having landed hard. He is gripping the grated flooring to maintain control, but his eyes are green, his face intense.

Quietly, she says to herself, "We're okay, right?"

\----------

On the outside of the helicarrier, Mike and his men have landed and are making their way across the deck and over to an air vent. Mike signals his men to kick in the vent and they do.

Inside, the grating is kicked in and the men jump down. Mike gives them orders. To three of the men, Mike orders, "Keep that engine down." He turns to two others, "Detention, wait for the cameras to go dark." He looks to last two, and starts walking forward, "Stay close."

\----------

Puck and Finn run through a dim, debris-filled hall.

Puck turns to Finn, "Find engine three. I'll meet you there."

Finn peels off as Puck approaches a tech room. Inside, Puck's Iron Man suit stands waiting, lit from above in all its glory.

\----------

In the dim light of the equipment room, Blaine continues to struggle to supress the rage, but his face is growing, changing slowly. Tina is pulling herself painfully free again.

Tina sees this and tries her best to calm Blaine down, "Blaine? Come on, you gotta fight it. This is just what Jesse wants. We're gonna be okay. Listen to me."

Two maintenance guys run in, and call out to Tina, "You hurt?"

Tina frantically waves them away. The two scatter as Tina looks back at Blaine. "We're gonna be okay. Right?" She pounds her fist on the ground and continues, "I swear on my life I will get you out of this, you will walk away, and never ever-"

Blaine cuts her off, "Your life?" His voice has a change in it - the bitter amusement is morphing to a growled threat. 

Blaine begins to transform into the Hulk, shirt tearing. He throws himself away from Tina, who looks terrified. Blaine continues to grow to a giant size. Then he turns to look at her, transforming - just as the lights go out.

Scared, Tina whispers, "Blaine?"

The transformation completes and Blaine's alter ego, the Hulk, gets unsteadily to his feet, and roars. 

Tina wrenches her foot free and stands looking - and the Hulk turns to look at her. She turns and runs up the catwalk stairs as the Hulk chases her, roaring. She swings over a catwalk, and rolls under a turbine, as the Hulk tears down the stairs. Tina jumps through small places as the Hulk grabs after her, roaring loudly. She crawls away under pipes.

\----------

Inside the glass cell, Jesse hears the Hulk roaring and smiles.

\----------

On the bridge, Schuester enters, yelling to his navigator. "Bring the carrier to a one-eight-zero south. Take us to the water."

"We're blind, sir," the navigator says. "Navigation recalibrated after the engine failure."

Schuester gives him an incredulous look, "Is the sun coming up?"

Hesitantly, the navigator replies, "Yes, sir."

Dryly, Schuester orders, "Then put it on the left. Get us over water. One more turbine goes down and we drop!"

\----------

Finn has just arrived to the damaged engine. He passes a couple of crew members who are still a bit disoriented from the blast. He speaks into his earpiece, "Puck! Puck, I'm here."

Puck in full Iron Man armor, flies in, close to the engine, "Good. Let's see what we've got."

He begins to examine the engine, his suit scanning through the different levels of machinery.

Puck's going over the scans, "I gotta get this super conducting cooling system back online before I can access the rotors, work on dislodging the debris." He turns to Finn, and points a few feet away, "I need you to get to that engine control panel and tell me which relays are in overload position."

Finn jumps and swings himself over to the control panel and opens it up while Iron Man works on the engine. 

Over his earpiece, he hears Puck ask, "What's it look like in there?"

Finn sighs, completely overwhelmed with the circuits, he doesn't really know what to say, "It seems to run on some form of electricity."

"Well, you're not wrong."

\----------

In the lower engine room, the place is still dark. Tina sneaks under an engine. She is hiding from the Hulk. She hears the footsteps. She pulls her gun, holding it ready and she moves out from the pipes and walks.

Suddenly, the Hulk jumps at her, roaring. Tina fires her gun at a pipe over his head and gas shoots out. She runs along a narrow passage, the Hulk crashing through behind her. He comes up on her fast. He catches up to her as she is about to run off the passage - he back hands her against a wall. 

Tina is groaning, terrified and trying to scramble away from the Hulk, as he steps towards her. He raises a fist, about to strike, when he is tackled through a wall -- by Sam. 

They are in the lower docking area. The two roll in to an area with planes and personnel running from the room. The two circle one another, as Tina takes the attack in - then the Hulk strikes, throwing wild punches as Sam ducks and weaves. The Hulk brings down a fist and Sam holds it above him, on his knees.

"We are not your enemies, Anderson!" Straining under the Hulk's forces, Sam continues, "Try to think!"

Hulk punches Sam across the room and through a container.

\----------

At the engine, Iron Man blasts away debris from the engine with his beam.

Puck hears Finn's voice in his helmet, "Okay, the relays are intact."

Finn pushes the engine control panel back in, "What's our next move?"

To himself, mostly, Puck says, "Even if I clear the rotors, this thing won't re-engage without a jump. I'm gonna have to get in there and push."

"Well, if that thing gets up to speed, you'll get shredded!"

"Then stay in the control unit and reverse polarity long enough to disengage maglev and that should-"

Finn cuts him off, "Speak English!"

Puck stops and takes a breath, "See that red lever?" Finn looks to his side, Puck continues, "It'll slow the rotors down long enough for me to get out. Stand by it, wait for my word."

Finn nods and makes his way over to the lever.

\----------

Back in the docking area, Sam flies into some stacked containers. He wipes a little blood from his nose. The Hulk roars and Sam looks up, grinning, and raises his hand. Mjolnir comes flying through the docking area and Sam catches it --just as the Hulk enters. Sam turns and hits him on the jaw - sending him into a plane. 

The Hulk gets up and rips the wing off the plane, flinging it at Sam, who ducks, causing the wing to hit a jeep. Sam throws Mjolnir. The Hulk catches the hammer but is pulled backwards. He tries to lift the hammer but cannot. He tries again and cracks the floor. Sam picks it up and wraps his arms around the Hulk's neck. Hulk tries swinging Sam off.

\----------

On the bridge, Schuester is at the controls and Santana is walking across the room.

He looks at her and orders, "We need full evac on the lower hangar bed."

Santana nods and walks up and signals some agents. They're almost at the doorway when small device rolls over to their feet.

Santana recognizes it immediately, "GRENADE!" She dives with an agent over a railing as the device explodes, sending agents flying. 

In the smoke, Jesse's men enter, guns at the ready. Schuester hangs back and knocks one out, using his gun to shoot at another. While he is taking care of a third, a fourth man enters and is about to fire when he is shot in the head. Will turns to see Santana holding her gun - she is pissed and bleeding.

\----------

Kurt reaches the armory, and makes his way over to the armory door. Over the intercom, he hears, "We've got perimeter breach. Hostiles are in SHIELD gear. Call out to every junction."

Kurt pushes down on a switch and scans his eyeball.

\----------

Back in the lower deck, Hulk and Sam crash through the floor of the Wishbone lab. Sam lays on the ground, he looks up, and Hulk grabs him by the throat.

\----------

Back on the bridge, Schuester, Santana, and other agents are shooting toward Jesse's men. The place is chaotic. Bridge Techs are taking cover and hiding from gunfire.

Someone from the lower deck comes on over the intercom, "We've got the Hulk and Sam on Research Level Four. Levels Two and Three are gone."

Santana turns towards Schuester and yells over all the chaos, "Sir, the Hulk will tear this place apart!"

Schuester nods, and simply tells her, "Get his attention."

Santana lowers her gun, and speaks into her earpiece, "Escort 6-Oh, proceed to Wishbone and engage hostile."

Outside, a jet piloted by a man, approaches the helicarrier. Over his radio, Santana adds on, "Don't get too close."

"Copy," the pilot replies. 

The jet flies to where Hulk and Sam are fighting, seemingly evenly matched. "Target acquired," the pilot raises the visor on his helmet. "Target engaged."

He fires his guns toward Hulk. The barrage of bullets bounce off of Hulk, as he turns and sees the jet. He roars, running at the window. Hulk crashes through it, leaping at the jet.

The pilots eyes widen dramatically, "Target angry! Target angry!"

Hulk lands on the nose of the jet and tears at the metal as it swerves in the air. The pilot tries to eject himself, but the Hulk grabs him and throws him off to the side. The pilot's parachute opens and the plane explodes, sending Hulk plummeting to the earth as he howls.

\----------

Back to the helicarrier, Iron Man saws off pieces of debris with a laser. He jumps on them, knocking them off the rotors.

Inside the engine, a pair of Jesse's men arrive at the engine. Finn sees them coming as one throws a grenade. He jumps into the air and slaps it away. He lands back on the carrier and moves to fight them off, standing close to the lever. He ends up punching and throwing one of the men off the carrier. Others open fire at him. Finn jumps onto a catwalk, picks up a machine gun, and begins firing at the last man.

\----------

On the bridge, Schuester is still shooting at the enemies.

Quietly, to himself, "They are not getting through here so what the-"

Suddenly, Mike fires arrows from above and they explode. SHIELD personnel are hit, taking cover. Mike fires another which hits the control panel. Schuester sees him and begins to shoot, while the arrow, having hit a plug, hacks the helicarrier systems, causing a second engine to malfunction.

The intercom comes on, "Engine One is now in shutdown."

The helicarrier tilts dangerously. Everyone in the bridge begins rolling.

A SHIELD tech calls out towards Schuester, "Sir, we've lost all power in Engine One."

\----------

In the lower engine room, Tina sits in the carnage of the Hulk's rampage, shaking.

Schuester's voice comes on over her earpiece, "It's Chang, he took out our systems. He's headed for the detention lab. Does anybody copy?"

Tina takes a second to catch her breath. 

She actives her comm, and in a steady voice says, "This is Agent Wu. I copy."

\----------

Back at the engine, Iron Man is trying to push the rotor. He hears Schuester's voice through his helmet, "Puckerman, we're losing altitude."

Strained, Puck replies, "Yep, noticed."

Iron Man flies in between the rotors and begins to push, slowly picking up speed as sparks fly. 

Inside, Finn is forced back by gunfire. He suddenly slips over the edge and falls - almost dropping off the carrier, hanging on by a wire.

\----------

Sam runs into the room where Jesse's contained. He sees one of Mike's men at the panel, and the door slides open.

"NO!" Sam yells as he runs over to Jesse who crouches defensively. Sam dives at him - only to go straight through him. Jesse reappears behind him and closes the door, locking Sam inside.

Jesse looks at Sam and sneers, "Are you ever not going to fall for that?"

\----------

On one of the lower levels, Mike is walking along a catwalk towards the detention lab. 

Tina appears suddenly behind him and Mike quickly turns and shoots an arrow, which flies by her. Tina pushes him hard. Mike charges her and Tina kicks him, then rolls underneath some pipes - popping up on the other side of the catwalk, kicking him in the knee. 

Mike shoots another arrow, which Tina narrowly dodges by dropping across to the next passage. Mike follows her. They fight along that catwalk. Mike tries hitting her with the bow and Tina pulls on the string, Mike snaps the bow forward, making Tina hit her own face. 

Tina smacks him across the face with the back of her hand, and then again with her elbow. Mike turns away from the blows and lets Tina turn away with his bow. Mike crouches low and removes a knife sheathed in his boot. 

\----------

With rage, Sam hits the cage with his hammer, it cracks but otherwise holds. Jesse looks satisfied, lets out a laugh, and turns to the control panel.

"The humans think us immortal," he looks towards Sam. "Shall we test that?"

Jesse moves to open the chute beneath the cell, dropping Sam too, what for any regular person, would be certain death.

Suddenly, Mike's man yells and is dropped to the ground. Kurt appears, wielding a large prototype Phase Two weapon. "Move away please," Kurt says as he slowly edges towards Jesse.

Jesse steps back from the panel, hands up. Kurt gestures to the gun.

"Do you like this? We started working on the prototype after you sent the Destroyer. Even I don't know what it does," he activates it. "Do you wanna find out?"

Kurt prepares to fire the weapon when, suddenly, Jesse disappears, reappearing behind him. He thrusts the point of his spear through Kurt's chest. He yells and drops to the floor, the gun falling away.

Sam rushes to the glass, lets out an anguished cry, "NO!"

Jesse returns to the panel and looks at his brother, Sam looks back at his brother, prepared. Jesse presses the button which sends the cell, and Sam, falling from the ship.

\----------

Tina and Mike are still fighting. Mike comes at Tina with his knife. Tina grabs Mike's elbow and thrusts it back at a angle. He groans and then he throws the dagger to his free hand. He swipes at Tina, but Tina grabs that hand too, trying to angle it at him. 

Mike hoists her against the rail. Mike grabs Tina's hair and pulls, exposing her neck to the dagger. Tina sinks her teeth into Mike's forearm and he lets go, trying to force her down when Tina flips, using his arm as leverage, and smacks Mike's head into the railing. He falls to the ground, groaning, then looks up.

Disoriented and confused, Mike rasps, "Tina?"

Tina sends him a left hook and Mike drops to the ground, unconscious. 

\----------

The cell is still dropping, flipping all over the place. Inside, Sam is trying desperately to break free from the cell, swinging Mjolnir at the glass sides as he plummets, twisting and turning, through the air. He finally manages to brace himself against a wall and launches across the space, crashing through the glass just before the cell slams into the ground. 

Outside, Sam crashes into a field like a meteorite, his hammer flying away from him. He lets out a groan of pain.

\----------

Inside the detention cell on the helicarrier, Kurt is slumped against a wall, unmoving, and Jesse turns to leave.

Quietly, Kurt tells him, "You're going to lose."

Jesse stops and turns back, "Am I?"

"It's in your nature," Kurt says simply. 

With a slight glare on his face, Jesse tells him, "Your heroes are scattered, your floating fortress falls from the sky. Where is my disadvantage?"

"You lack conviction."

Anger written across his face, Jesse starts, "I don't think I-"

Kurt fires the weapon, cutting him off, which shoots a blast of fire similar to that of the Destroyer, sending Jesse flying through a wall.

"So that's what it does," Kurts says softly to himself. 

\----------

At the broken engine, the helicarrier is still falling. Puck is attempting to kick start the engine by manually moving the huge rotors. He is pushing the blades, flying faster and faster until they start spinning on their own and the ship levels off.

"Cap, hit the lever!" Puck calls out from his helmet.

Finn, who's still hanging from the side of the ship by a power cord with a gunman shooting at him.

"I need a minute here!" Finn yells over the roar of the wind.

Puck's still pushing the blades, and with some strain in his voice says, "Lever! Now!"

Cap slowly hauls himself up, barely making it through the bullets. Iron Man is pushed back up against one of the rotors, now spinning too fast for him to escape.

"Uh-oh," Puck says before he's sucked into the blades and is spun wildly around. 

Finn finally manages to crawl over and reach up, pulling the lever. 

Puck is finally able to fly out. He manages to right himself and flies back to the ship, taking out the gunman shooting at Finn.

On top of the carrier, a jet takes off. Inside it is Jesse, who is smiling and watching the carrier.

\----------

Back inside the detention room, Kurt is slumped on the floor with the gun in his lap. Schuester runs in and kneels down by him.

"I'm sorry, boss. He rabbited."

"Just stay awake. Eyes on me," Scuester orders.

"Oh, I'm clockin' out here," Kurt says softly.

"Not an option," Schuester says and shakes his head.

"It's okay, boss. This was never gonna work...if they didn't have something...to..."

His breathing halts and Schuester slowly stands to let the medical team through. He leans against the railing.

\----------

Back on the bridge, Santana is having a head wound tended to. Over her earpiece she hears Schuester's voice solemnly say, "Agent Hummel is down."

Santana pushes the doctor away, concerned.

Elsewhere, Tina stands on the catwalk as Mike is dragged away by some agents. She listens intently.

Over Tina's earpiece, a SHIELD tech says, "A medical team is on its way to your location."

Over the comm, Schuester says, "They're here."

Inside the engine room, Puck and Finn stand together by the engine, quietly listening.

Over their earpieces, Schuester continues, "They called it."

\----------

Some time later, at the conference table, Finn, Puck, and Will are gathered. Santana stands off to the side. Will pulls a handful of cards out.

"These were in Kurt Hummel's jacket. Guess he never did get you to sign them," Schuester says as he scatters them on the table. Some are wet with blood.

"We're dead in the air up here. Our communications, location of the cube, Blaine, Sam," he lets out a sigh. "I got nothing for you. Lost my one good eye. Think I had that coming."

He begins to make his way around the table to Finn and Puck.

"Yes, we were going to build an arsenal with the Tesseract. I never put all my chips on that number, though, because I was playing something even riskier. There was an idea, Puck knows this, called the Avengers Initiative. The idea was to bring together a group of remarkable people, see if they could become something more. See if they could work together when we needed them to, to fight the battles that we never could. Kurt Hummel died still believing in that idea, in heroes."

Puck abruptly stands and walks out.

Schuester turns to Finn, "Well, it's an old fashioned notion."

\----------

In the remote field, Sam is making his way over to Mjolnir. He hesitates to pick it up, fearing he is not worthy anymore. He clenches his fist.

\----------

In an abandoned warehouse, Blaine wakes, naked, in a pile of rubble. There is a security guard standing behind him.

"You fell out of the sky," 

Blaine turns to looks at him, shame across his face, "Did I hurt anyone?"

"There's nobody around here to get hurt," the guard tells him. "You did scare the hell out of some pigeons though."

Blaine scoffs, "Lucky."

"Or just good aim. You were awake when you fell."

Blaine looks at him directly, "You saw?"

The guard nods, "The whole thing, right through the ceiling. Big and green and buck ass nude."

"Here," he throws Blaine some clothes, which he begins to pull on.

"I didn't think those would fit you until you shrunk down to a regular size fella," the guard continues.

"Thanks," Blaine says as he finishes fastening up his pants.

After a couple of moments, the guard asks, "Are you an alien?"

Blaine has a confused look on his face, "What?"

"From outer space, an alien?"

Blaine looks down and shakes his head, "No."

"Well then, son, you've got a condition."

\----------

In a medical room on the helicarrier, Mike is strapped to a hospital bed. Tina sits by him as he strains against the bonds, breathing hard and shaking his head.

Tina lets out a sigh and says, "Mike, you're gonna be alright."

Mike scoffs, and says with an edge, "You know that? Is that what you know?" His voice loses the edge, and he sounds kind of panicked when he says, "I gotta go in though. I have to flush him out."

Tina stands and walks over to a table, pouring him some water as she says, "You gotta level out, it's gonna take time."

Still with some panic in his voice, Mike says, "You don't understand. Have you ever had someone take your brain and play? Pull you out and stuff something else in? You know what it's like to be unmade?"

Tina turns her head to the side to look at him, and says softly with some significance, "You know that I do."

Mike realizes what he's said, and who he said it to, and realizes that he's no longer under Jesse's control, "Why am I back? How did you get him out?"

"Cognitive recalibration," Tina says with a small smirk, as she comes to sit with him on the bed. "I hit you really hard in the head."

Mike slightly scoffs, and the corners of his mouth turn up a bit, "Thanks."

Tina reaches over and begins to remove the strap restraints.

Mike lets out a sigh before he starts to ask, "Tee, how many agents-?"

Tina cuts him off quickly, and says with conviction, "Don't. Don't do that to yourself, Mike. This is Jesse. This is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for."

Tina finishes undoing the restraints, and gets up letting Mike stretch out before he asks, "Jesse. He get away?"

"Yeah. I don't suppose you know where?"

Mike shakes his head, "Didn't need to know. Didn't ask. He's gonna make his play soon though, today." 

Tina walks to the door, "We gotta stop him."

Mike takes a drink from the water Tina poured for him, "Yeah? Who's we?"

Tina turns to look at him and with a small shrug says, "I don't know. Whoever is left."

Mike gives a small nod, "Well, if I put an arrow through Jesse's eye socket I'd sleep better, I suppose."

Tina walks over and sits next to him, smirk on her face, "Now you sound like you."

Mike looks back at her and gives her a small smile, "But you don't." He watches the smirk leave her face as he continues, "You're a spy, not a soldier. Now you want to wade into a war. Why? What did Jesse do to you?"

Tina slightly shakes her head, "He didn't, I just-"

Concerned, Mike says softly, "Christina."

Tina looks away from him, "I've been compromised." After a moment, she turns back to him, and continues, "I got red in my ledger. I'd like to wipe it out."

Mike nods, understanding where she's coming from.

\----------

In the empty detention room, Puck stands overlooking the spot where Kurt laid hours before. There's still some blood staining the floor. 

Finn enters the room, "Was he married?"

Puck doesn't look away from the spot, but answers, "No. There was a, uh- singer, I think."

"I'm sorry. He seemed like a good man."

Puck scoffs, and finally looks toward Finn, "He was an idiot."

Puck and Finn slowly move toward each other.

"Why? For believing?"

"For taking on Jesse alone."

"He was doing his job."

"He was out of his league. He should have waited. He should have-"

Finn cuts him off, "Sometimes there isn't a way out, Puck."

"Right. How did that work for him?"

After a moment, Finn asks, "Is this the first time you've lost a soldier?"

Puck snaps at his words and says fiercely, "We are not soldiers! I'm not marching to Schuester's fife!"

"Neither am I. He's got the same blood on his hands that Jesse does, but right now we gotta put that behind us and get this done." 

Puck looks back down at the place Kurt fell, as Finn continues talking, "Now Jesse needs a power source, if we can put together a list-"

Puck cuts him off, "He made it personal."

Finn shakes his head, "That's not the point."

Puck, putting everything together, "That is the point. That's Jesse's point. He hit us all right where we live. Why?"

"To tear us apart."

Puck nods, "Yeah, divide and conquer is great, but he knows he has to take us out to win, right? That's what he wants. He wants to beat us, he wants to be seen doing it." He's catching on to what Jesse has planned, "He wants an audience."

Finn nods, "Right. I caught his act in Stuttgart."

"Yeah. That's just previews, this is- this is opening night. And Jesse, he's a full-tail diva," Puck says, gesturing, "He wants flowers, he wants parades, he wants a monument built to the skies with his name plastered-," Puck stops, realizing where Jesse is. "Son of a bitch."

\----------

On the Puckerman Tower rooftop. Dr. Howell is setting up the device to open the portal, using the power from the building.

\----------

Back to the medical room, Tina is sitting on the bed. She looks up as Finn enters, suited up, a look of confusion crosses her face. 

Not wasting any time, Finn says, "Time to go."

"Go where?"

"I'll tell you on the way. Can you fly one of those jets?"

Mike enters from the restroom, drying his hands, "I can."

Finn looks at Tina, who slowly nods, he turns back to Mike, "Got a suit?"

"Yeah."

"Then suit up," Finn says, and then walks out.

\----------

In the field, Sam lifts Mjolnir up and then points it to the skies. The field grows dark with clouds.

Finn straps his shield onto his back. Mike puts on his quiver.

Tina powers up her Widow's Bite. Her bracelets light up.

Puck is in a workshop making repairs to his helmet. The helmet lights up.

Sam summons a bolt of lightning. His armor slowly begins to fly on.

Mike and Tina walk side-by-side behind Captain America, who is leading them through the lower hangar bay. They're all ready to fight.

Sam's armor finally gathers.

In the hangar, Finn, Mike, and Tina walk onto the jet where SHIELD techs are working.

One of them speaks up, "Hey, you guys aren't authorized to be in here."

Finn cuts him off, "Son, just don't!"

\----------

On the bridge, Schuester is holding Kurt's cards, overlooking the air deck. Santana walks up behind him.

"Sir."

He doesn't turn to look at her, "Agent Lopez."

Hesitantly, she says, "Those cards, they were in Kurt's locker, not his jacket."

Staring at the cards, Schuester says softly, "They needed the push."

He sees the jet and Iron Man take off towards the city.

The intercom comes on, "We've got unauthorized departure from Bay Six."

"They found it," Schuester sounds pleased and turns around, "Get our communications back up, whatever you have to do. I want eyes on everything."

Santana nods curtly, "Yes, sir."


	9. Chapter 9

Iron Man is flying towards New York, his suit is losing power. He manages to right himself and continues to make his way to Puckerman Tower.

On the tower rooftop, Dr. Howell is ready to activate the device he created with the Tesseract. Iron Man slowly reaches him.

Puck hears JARVIS' voice in his helmet, "Sir, I turned off the arc reactor. But the device is already self-sustaining."

Puck slowly pulls up a few feet away, "Shut it down, Howell."

"It's too late! She can't stop now," Carl shouts, looking toward the sky. He turns to Puck, an awed expression on his face, "She wants to show us something! A new universe!"

Annoyance in his voice, Puck says, "Okay."

He fires a repulsor blast at the device, but the Tesseract creates a barrier and deflects it, sending the energy outwards, knocking Carl's head against the building, making him unconscious, and Iron Man back.

"The barrier is pure energy. It's unbreachable," JARVIS informs Puck.

"Yeah, I got that," Puck looks down to see Jesse on the platform outside the penthouse. "All right. Plan B."

"Sir, the Mark Seven is not ready for deployment."

"Then skip the spinning rims, we're on the clock," Puck says, anxiously.

He lands and as his suit is deconstructed, he walks through into the tower penthouse, watching Jesse carefully. Jesse walks in as well.

Inside the tower, Jesse walks forward as Puck goes behind the bar.

"Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity," Jesse says sarcastically. 

"Uh- actually, I'm planning to threaten you."

Jesse chuckles, "You should have left your armor on for that."

Puck nods, "Yeah, it's seen a bit of mileage, plus you've got the uh- blue stick of destiny." He reaches for a bottle, "Would you like a drink?"

"Stalling me won't change anything."

"No, no, no- threatening," Puck reaches for a tumbler. "No drink? You sure? I'm having one."

Jesse turns towards the windows, and looks up at the sky, "The Chitauri are coming, nothing will change that. What have I to fear?"

With Jesse turned away, Puck pours the liquor into his glass, "The Avengers." Jesse looks back towards him, and Puck shrugs, "It's what we call ourselves, sort of like a team. 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes' type of thing."

Jesse scoffs, "Yes, I've met them."

"Yeah, takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one. But, let's do a head count here. Your brother, the Demi-God;" Jesse turns away in disgust and Puck slips a pair of bracelets onto his wrists. "A super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend; a man with breath-taking anger management issues; a couple of master assassins, and you," Puck takes a drink and points at him. "You've managed to piss off every single one of them."

"That was the plan."

Drink in hand, Puck begins to walk to the center of the penthouse where Jesse is.

"Not a great plan. When they come, and they will, they'll come for you."

Threateningly, Jesse reaffirms, "I have an army."

Not phased, Puck replies boldly, "We have a Hulk!"

"Oh, I thought the beast had wandered off."

"Yeah- you're missing the point. There's no throne, there is no version of this, where you come out on top. Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you," Puck stops walking. He takes a deep breath, and says fiercely, "'Cause if we can't protect the earth, you can be damned well sure we'll avenge it."

Jesse walks over to Puck, pointing his scepter.

"Well, how will your friends have time for me...when they're so busy fighting you?"

He walks up to Puck, and places the tip of the scepter over his heart. It clinks against the arc reactor. Nothing happens.

Jesse's at a loss, "This usually works."

He tries again, to no effect.

"Well, performance issues," Puck shrugs. "Not that uncommon, actually. One out of five-"

Jesse cuts him off and grabs Puck by the throat and throws him across the room.

Puck coughs, and says softly as Jesse walks towards him, "JARVIS, anytime now."

Jesse grabs Puck by the throat and hauls him straight up, "You will all fall before me!"

Straining under the pressure on his throat, Puck rasps, "JARVIS. Deploy! Deploy deploy!"

Jesse sends Puck crashing through the window, and plummeting toward the ground. Behind Jesse, the Mark Seven suit goes rocketing past and out after Puck.

As Puck falls, the suit catches up to him and, locking on to the bracelets, attaches to him and unfolds to a full suit. Puck manages to stop his fall moments before he hits the ground and flies back up to Jesse at the window, where he stops.

"And there's one other person you pissed off! His name is Kurt!" He fires a repulsor blast at Jesse and he is knocked backwards.

Meanwhile the device has powered up and shoots a stream of blue energy at the sky, which opens into a portal where the Chitauri army waits. The hoards of aliens begin to fly through. They look like an alien/machine hybrid, some kind of soulless automaton.

Puck looks up, "Right! Army."

Iron Man speeds towards the incoming army, shooting at them. The Chitauri fire back at him. He fires more blasts, spinning out the way, dodging the exploding debris. Iron Man continues flying higher. BAM! He is hit by an Chitauri hovercraft. He rights himself and releases mini-missiles at the Chitauri, blowing them up.

\----------

Below on the streets, the citizens get out of their taxis and vehicles, looking to the sky. They run for their lives as the Chitauri come toward them - blowing up cars, buildings, and the streets. 

At an outdoor cafe, the Chitauri fire at the restaurant. A brunette waitress and her co-workers are left outside, they duck and take cover from the shots. When they get the chance, they take off inside the cafe. She, her co-workers, and customers look out the window at the destruction that the aliens cause.

\----------

Atop Puckerman Tower, Jesse walks out on the pad, his Asgardian armor materializing as he looks out over the chaos below. Suddenly, Sam lands lower on the platform.

"Jesse! Turn off the Tesseract or I'll destroy it!" Sam yells over the chaos and destruction. 

"You can't. There is no stopping it. There is only the war!"

"So be it."

Jesse leaps at Sam and the two begin to fight. Sam knocks the scepter to the side and a blast from it sends one of the letters of the PUCKERMAN on the Tower falling to the ground.

\----------

Below, civilians are running for their lives, screaming. Several police cars show up. A large female police sergeant and a young male cop step out of their car where they look up at the Chitauri.

\----------

Elsewhere, the jet flies toward Puckerman Tower, which is beaming the blue stream to the sky.

Tina's speaking over her radio to Puck, "Puck, we're on Route Three heading north east."

"What, did you stop for drive-thru?!" Puck says, sounding frazzled. "Swing up Park, I'm gonna lay 'em out for you."

Iron Man flies fast, leading a troop of Chitauri past Puckerman Tower - where Sam and Jesse still fight each other. 

He flies around the building, takes a sharp turn - causing some of the troop to crash. 

Inside the jet, Mike and Tina are piloting the plane. They release the cannon gun. Iron Man flies past them at high speed and they release continuous fire at the troop of Chitauri in front of them. They fly through the smoke and up to Puckerman Tower.

"Sir, we have more incoming," JARVIS informs Puck.

"Fine. Let's keep them occupied."

The jet comes around a building, blasting the army who are firing at them. One of the wings are grazed by Chitauri gunfire. 

They slow as the come to the top of Puckerman Tower. There, Sam smashes Jesse's head into a glass on the catwalk of the tower. They still fight.

Mike calls out over his shoulder, "Tee!"

"I see 'em," Tina says, quickly.

Jesse spots the jet. He throws Sam to the floor, then blasts one of the jet's rotor blades with his scepter - it catches fire.

Sam sees, angry, and he charges Jesse and tackles him as the jet falls to the ground. Jesse and Sam throw punches.

\----------

Inside the jet, Tina and Mike hold on for their dear lives. Finn grabs a hold of the roof as the plane grazes buildings and crashes to the street. Tina and Mike remove their headsets, open the ramp, and Finn and them exit the jet.

"We gotta get back up there!" Finn yells.

They run onto the overpass, looking up at Puckerman Tower. They freeze as they see a giant armored Leviathan - a warship of the Chitauri, flies through the portal with many more warriors aboard. The warriors jump onto the side of buildings and into the buildings where they shoot civilians.

Finn's eyes dart around, "Puck, are you seeing this?"

Puck's voice comes in clear over his earpiece, "Seeing. Still working on believing. Where's Anderson? Has he shown up yet?"

Finn sounds confused, "Blaine?"

"Just keep me posted, " Puck says as he flies after the Leviathan. "JARVIS, find me a soft spot."

The Leviathan tears through buildings, roaring.

\----------

Atop the Tower, Sam holds Jesse down and gestures to the chaos in Manhattan below them.

"Look at this," Sam yells at Jesse. "Look around you! You think this madness will end with your rule?"

"It's too late," Jesse says as he looks around, wide eyed. "It's too late to stop it."

Sam shakes his head, "No. We can, together."

Jesse pauses, then slips a knife into his hand and stabs Sam.

With venom, Jesse growls out, "Sentiment!"

Sam gets back up, enraged, and lifts Jesse, then drops him. Jesse rolls himself off the edge of the building, only to land on one of the flying Chitauri crafts. He flies off with a troop of Chitauri. Sam removes the blade and puts his hand over the wound, grimacing.

\----------

Back down below, Mike and Tina are crouched behind a taxi cab. Finn is with them.

"We've got civilians trapped," Mike says, as he looks around noting all the places the people are hidden from the blasts.

Jesse and his following troop blowing up the streets. A family runs away as they are almost shot. Jesse and the troop come to a busy street - the one where the young cop and police sergeant are at - and blow up cars. The police and civilians run for their lives.

Finn watches the scene unfold, and tells Hawkeye and Black Widow, "They're fish in a barrel down there."

Tina stands and fires both her guns at an incoming group of Chitauri.

She looks toward Cap and says, "We got this. Go!"

"You think you can hold them off?"

Mike nods, "Captain, it would be my genuine pleasure."

He grabs an arrow and shoots it, hitting one alien in the head, and the arrow quickly separates into more pieces, killing three Chitauri aliens.

Finn leaves the other two fighting and jumps off an overpass, rolling onto a bus and into the street.

Mike helps people off a bus as Tina shoots her pistols at Chitauri. He runs over to Tina and begins releasing arrows as she shoots.

"Just like Budapest all over again," Tina yells over her gunfire, a small smirk on her face.

Mike shakes his head, as he contines to shoot arrows, and looks all around him, "You and I remember Budapest very differently."

\----------

Meanwhile, Finn runs through the street towards a group of police shooting at Adrenali. He is running and jumping off cars.

The young cop turns towards his sergeant, "Bieste, it's gonna be an hour before they scramble the National Guard."

"The National Guard," she asks a bit incredulously. The two duck to avoid an Chitauri blast. "Does the army know what's happening here, Lynn!?"

He looks around helplessly, "Do we?"

Finn jumps down on the car in front of them.

Finn gestures to them, "You need men in these buildings. There are people inside and they can be running right into the line of fire. You take them to the basement or through the subway, you keep them off the streets. I need a perimeter as far back as 39th."

Bieste looks confused and asks, "Why the hell should I take orders from you?"

Two Chitauri warriors attack Finn, he fights them off easily then turns back to the two policemen. They stand in shock. The sergeant reacts and walks back to her men.

Bieste rapidly gives orders, "I need men in those buildings, lead the people down and away from the streets." She grabs her radio, and says into it, "We're gonna set up a perimeter all the way down to 39th street."

\----------

Meanwhile, Iron Man fires a stream of ammunition at the Leviathan, which turns to follow him.

"Okay, got his attention," Puck says triumphantly. He then realizes out loud, "What was step 2 again?"

He flies off and the Leviathan follows him.

\----------

Mike and Tina are fighting warriors up close. Mike trips one with his bow. He pulls an arrow out and stabs it in the chest. Tina is using her Widow's Bite on a warrior as she sits on his neck, legs wrapped around his torso. Tina then picks up a Chitauri weapon and is using it to fight off the warriors. One warrior tries to slice her head off and she slides, dodging it. She jumps to her feet and hits it in the head with the sharp part of the weapon. Mike knocks over another warrior. He grabs an arrow and shoots behind himself, killing another warrior. He marches over to another Chitauri and battles him.

Meanwhile Tina is taking on three warriors by herself. She shoots one, then spins around and stabs one in the neck. Mike is tackled to the cement by a warrior. He groans and stabs one with a arrow, then throws the warrior to the ground. Out of nowhere, another Chitauri attacks him and throws him onto the trunk of a cab. 

Tina stabs a warrior with the Chitauri weapon. She hits the other over the head. She spins to her knees, aims in one direction, and fires. Another Chitauri charges, she spins the weapon in that direction and fires. She continuously fires as Mike fights more aliens in the background. Mike's head is slammed into the roof of a car. He is then thrown to the ground by a warrior. He's tired, but still continues to fight.

Tina takes on two more Chitauri. They back her onto a taxi cab. They hit after her but she moves her head out of the way. She gets her footing, and tries to hit them with the weapon but a warrior grabs it and throws her feet into the air. She lands on a car's roof and screams in pain, breathing heavily. 

Mike shoots more warriors around them, they are becoming overwhelmed but they keep on. Tina regains her strength, runs to the aid of Mike by firing at Chitauri as he slides and shoots at Chitauri. Tina and Mike are becoming surrounded by Chitauri - and Finn rejoins them, hitting Chitauri out the way. Sam drops down from the tower and kills a bunch of Chitauri with a bolt of lightning. Everyone gathers.

Finn looks toward Sam and asks, "What's the story upstairs?"

Sam looks grave as he explains, "The power surrounding the cube is impenetrable."

Puck's voice comes on over their earpieces, "Sam is right, we gotta deal with these guys."

Tina looks between them, and asks, "How do we do this?"

"As a team," Finn says with no hesitation. 

Sam moves closer towards him, "I have unfinished business with Jesse."

Mike, who was gathering up his arrows from the dead aliens, says with some malice, "Oh yeah! Get in line."

Finn looks over to him, "Save it. Jesse's gonna keep this fight focused on us and that's what we need. Without him these things could run wild. We got Puck up top, he's gonna need us to-"

He stops, hearing Blaine arrive on a motorbike. Finn and the others walk over as Blaine dismounts, surveying the damage.

Blaine smirks, "So, this all seems horrible."

Tina gives him a wary look, "I've seen worse."

Blaine looks towards her, and says sincerely, "Sorry."

"No," she says quickly, and then adds on, "We could use a little worse."

Finn speaks into his earpiece, "Puck, we got him."

Puck's voice perks up a bit, "Anderson?"

"Just like you said," Finn says with a smirk.

"Then tell him to suit up," Puck says seriously. Then says, "I'm bringing the party to you."

Iron Man flies around a corner and towards the group, followed closely by the Leviathan. Everyone takes a step back.

Tina shakes her head slightly, and says, "I- I don't see how that's a party. "

Iron Man draws the creature low and it skims the road. Blaine turns and begins to walk away, towards the Leviathan.

Finn looks slightly alarmed, and says, "Doctor, now might be a really good time for you to get angry."

Blaine stops, and looks over his shoulder, "That's my secret, Captain. I'm always angry."

Blaine suddenly transforms into the Hulk and, with a turn, punches the Leviathan, smashing it into the ground. The massive beast is stopped dead. The rear of the creature flips up, still moving too fast.

Puck comes around and yells, "Hold on!"

Iron Man blasts a missile at the creature and it explodes. Mike and Sam hold their weapons overhead to block the blast. Finn ducks with his shield over himself and Tina.

Among all the buildings, the Chitauri cry out. We do a 360 degree spin: The Avengers stand in a circle. Puck comes to a landing, Blaine roars, Mike nocks an arrow, Sam readies Mjolnir, Tina reloads her gun, and Finn stands ready with his shield. They look up at the army all around them. Ready.


	10. Chapter 10

We see The Avengers in their circle. Jesse looks down from above.

"Send the rest," he orders.

The Avengers look up, watching as several more Leviathans and hundreds of warriors fly through the portal.

Tina has a wary look on her face, "Guys?"

Puck speaks up first, "Call it, Captain."

Finn nods, and then orders, "Alright, listen up. Until we can close that portal up there, we're gonna use containment." He looks towards Mike, "Chang, I want you on that roof, eyes on everything. Call out patterns and strays." He then looks towards Iron Man, "Puck, you got the perimeter. Anything gets more than three blocks out, you turn it back or you turn it to ash."

Mike looks towards Puck, "Wanna give me a lift?"

"Right. Better clench up, Legolas."

Mike braces himself as Puck grabs him by the scruff of his vest, and flies him up to the top of a building, then flies off.

Finn turns towards Sam, "Sam. You gotta try and bottleneck that portal, slow 'em down. You got the lightning, light the bastards up."

Sam nods and swings Mjolnir, flying off.

Finn finally turns to Tina and says, "You and me, we stay here on the ground, keep the fighting here."

Finn looks up towards The Hulk, "And Hulk!" The Hulk turns around facing Finn, who points at him, "Smash!"

The Hulk grins, then leaps off, taking out dozens of warriors that are on the sides of the buildings - grabbing them, smashing them, throwing them. The Hulk leaps across the air and slaps a flying craft out of the air.

\----------

Sam lands at to the top of the Chrysler building. He lifts his hammer and summons a bolt of lightning. He sends it shooting out towards the portal, taking out warriors and a Leviathan.

\----------

On the helicarrier, Schuester is at his command center watching the news footage. Santana approaches him, and tells him, "Sir. Figgins is on."

Schuester nods and heads to the communication room.

\----------

Back in New York, Mike is atop a building, firing relentlessly at the Chitauri warriors. 

He speaks into his comm device, "Puck, you gotta lot of strays on your tail."

A troop of Chitauri warriors are following Iron Man as he flies above the streets. Puck voices comes out clear, "Just tryin' to keep them off the streets."

Mike chuckles, "Well they can't bank worth a damn. Find a tight corner."

Mike shoots at crafts. He shoots behind his back with out looking - the arrow hits another craft, causing it to explode.

Puck nods, "I will roger that."

Iron Man flies by Mike who fires at the crafts, blowing them up. Iron Man swerves behind two crafts and fires at them. He continues taking a series of quick turns as the Chitauri quickly drop, crash, or follow.

In a slightly tense tone, Puck says, "Oh, boy!"

Iron Man goes flying through a tunnel and turns tightly at the end, sending the last few crafts crashing into a building.

"Nice call," Puck calls out towards Mike. "What else you got?"

Mike's voice comes out clear over his helmet, "Well, Sam's taking out a squadron down on 6th."

A mocking tone of outrage comes out of his mouth, "And he didn't invite me!"

\----------

Elsewhere, a Leviathan approaches an office building and the inhabitants look on, scared. We hear fast and heavy footsteps. It's Hulk charging through the building, jumping through the window and pulling the creature away from the building.

\----------

Tina is going to town as she fights a warrior. She is thrown upon the hood of a car. As the warrior is about to attack, Tina uses her Widow's Bite on it, shocking him out. She grabs the Chitauri gun and shoots him back. Someone lands behind her so she quickly turns and aims, but it's Captain America. She stands down and leans against a car.

Tina lets out a few heavy breaths before she says, "Captain, none of this is gonna mean a damn thing if we don't close that portal."

Finn nods, but says, "Our biggest guns couldn't touch it."

Tina looks up towards the portal, "Well, maybe it's not about guns."

"You wanna get up there, you're gonna need a ride."

Tina glances up, seeing the Chitauri crafts fly past. She makes her way over to the other side of the overpass.

She tosses the gun down and says, "I got a ride. I could use a boost though."

Finn readies his shield in front of him, and asks, "You sure about this?"

With a serious face on, she nods, "Yeah, it's gonna be fun!"

Tina runs at Finn, who uses his shield to boost her up. She grabs on to a passing Chitauri vehicle. Finn looks up as she flies off in the distance. He looks to his right and there are more warriors coming.

\----------

Tina climbs aboard the craft, pulls a dagger and stabs a warrior. She spin kicks him off the craft. She makes her way to the other one and uses him to control the vehicle.

"Turn, turn, ah!"

Two crafts come upon Tina, firing at her. She swerves to avoid them. The crafts are blasted away by Iron Man, who fires away at a fleet behind him. Iron Man takes a turn, coming up on the overpass, where he knocks Chitauri aliens over and lands by Captain America, who is fighting and kicking Chitauri. Finn lifts his shield. Iron Man reflects a repulsor blast off the shield, taking out the surrounding warriors. He then flies up the side of a building, hitting more warriors. At the top of which Mike fires into the head of a Chitauri. Two blasts are fired at him. He ducks and returns a shot by firing an arrow. The arrow hits the pilot of a craft which falls and smashes into a Leviathan. On the creature is the Hulk who is fighting off warriors. Sam then lands on the same creature and takes on warriors with Hulk. Then Hulk breaks off a piece of the creature's armor, jumps and slams it into the creature's head. Sam uses Mjolnir to summon lightning as he hits it and drive the metal into its head. The creature crashes to the ground, landing in Grand Central Station. Sam and Hulk dismount the creature and stand together, breathing heavily. Suddenly, Hulk punches Sam away and smirks.

\----------

Carl Howell, having been knocked out when Puck tried to stop the Tesseract, awakens. He looks around, he's free from Jesse's control. Army tanks and soldiers begin to arrive on scene. They shoot at the Chitauri, a little amazed at what is going on.

\----------

Finn is on the ground, holding off a Chitauri's weapon. He pushes the warrior off and onto sharp debris. 

As he stands, he hears Mike's voice over his earpiece, "Captain, the bank on 42nd, past Madison. They cornered a lot of civilians in there."

"I'm on it," Finn says as he walks off. 

\----------

In the bank, a crowd of civilians are surrounded by three armed warriors. Finn jumps through a window and tosses his shield, knocking the explosive away from a Chitauri. 

As the others turn to fire, he leaps behind a desk. Finn then kicks the desk at them, stunning the warriors. He snaps the neck of one and throws him into the pit.

"Everyone clear out!"

He is then grabbed by a warrior, who he fights and breaks free, getting his cowl pulled off. The explosive device begins to beep. As a Chitauri scrambles for it, Finn rolls, scooping up his shield. He jumps in the air, crouching behind the shield. Then the bomb goes off and it blasts Finn out of a window and onto a car. He stands silently while police lead the civilians from the building. The brunette waitress from before watches Finn.

\----------

In the communication room on the helicarrier, Schuester stands, talking to Figgins. "William, I have made my decision..."

Schuester's voice is tense, "I recognize that you've made a decision, but given that it's a stupid-ass decision, I've elected to ignore it."

"You're closer than any of our subs, you scramble that jet-"

Santana is breathing nervously, panicking, as she listens and watches outside.

In an angry tone, Schuester almost yells, "That is the island of Manhattan, sir. Until I'm certain my team can't hold it, I will not order a nuclear strike against a civilian population."

"If we don't hold them here, we lose everything."

With significance, Schuester says, "I send that bird out, we already have." He angrily hangs up on Figgins. 

\----------

Meanwhile, Tina's still on board a Chitauri craft. She is shot at from behind and turns to see Jesse, on another craft, following behind. "Oh, you," she says with disdain.

She continues on toward the building Mike is at. As she approaches, she calls out over her comm device, "Hawkeye!"

Atop his building, Mike sees her coming in the distance, "Tee, what are you doing?"

"Uh, a little help," Tina calls out.

Mike nocks an arrow, his bowstring against his cheek. "I got him," he says with a smirk.

Mike aims and fires. Jesse catches the arrow inches from his face and looks first at it, then at Mike, a mocking smirk on his face. The arrow then explodes, sending Jesse crashing onto the platform at the top of Puckerman Tower.

\----------

Above, Tina jumps off the craft. She flips in the air, landing onto the roof. She rolls, sticking the landing, and flips her hair back.

In the tower, Jesse rises and looks up at Tina when Hulk leaps up, grabbing him and throwing him through the window of the penthouse. He roars and moves towards Jesse, who gets to his feet.

"ENOUGH," Jesse yells, and Hulk pauses. "You are, all of you, beneath me! I AM A GOD, YOU DULL CREATURE, AND I WILL NOT BE BULLIED BY-"

Hulk grabs Jesse by the feet and smashes him into the floor repeatedly, then throws him aside. "Puny god," Hulks scoffs, as he walks away. 

Jesse whimpers in pain. He has been beaten into submission.

\----------

On the rooftop, Tina walks toward the Tesseract.

"The scepter," Dr. Howell rasps out.

Tina turns and walks over to him. "Doctor," She says as she kneels.

"Jesse's scepter, the energy-," Carl repeats. He then shakes his head, "The Tesseract can't fight. You can't protect against yourself."

"It's not your fault. You didn't know what you were doing."

"Well, actually I think I did. I built in a safety to cut the power source."

Tina realizes what he's trying to tell her, "Jesse's scepter."

Dr. Howell nods, "It may be able to close the portal. And I'm looking right at it."

He looks down to the platform below, where Jesse's scepter lies dropped from when Hulk took him out.

\----------

Sam is aboard a craft, fighting Chitauri. The craft swerves when a Leviathan crashes through a building, followed closely by Puck, who is shooting at it with lasers.

JARVIS' voice comes in through Puck's helmet, "Sir, we will lose power before we penetrate that shell."

Iron Man pulls away from the Leviathan. He flies fast.

"JARVIS, you ever hear the tale of Jonah?"

JARVIS' voice has a hint of worry to it, "I wouldn't consider him a role model, sir."

Iron Man's knee plates open, pushing out blades. He is heading directly toward the creature's mouth. He flies through it. Blowing up the creature's insides and out the tail end. He crashes to the ground but gets to his feet, only to be shot down again by warriors.

\----------

Atop the building, Mike is attacked by warriors. He reaches for an arrow, but his quiver is empty. He instead uses the bow to fight them off. Looking up at the sky and seeing hundreds of approaching flying crafts, he pulls a single arrow from the body of a Chitauri and changes its head with the push of a button on his bow. In slo-mo, The Chitauri fire and Mike leaps off the building as it explodes, twisting in mid-air, then firing the arrow. Its head opens up into a grappling hook which attaches to the side of the building. Mike swings from the wire still attached to his bow and crashes through a window into a lower floor of the building. He lands painfully with a groan.

\----------

On another roof, Hulk is being attacked by Chitauri warriors. He throws them off and turns his attention to the sky, where dozens of crafts are flying over him, and roars. They all fire at once and Hulk is encompassed in smoke and flame. He roars, unable to fight back.

\----------

On the helicarrier, a jet is being lifted from the hangar and to the deck.

Figgins is speaking over the radio to the jet's pilot, "Director Schuester is no longer in command. Override seven-alpha-one-one."

The jet pilot responds, "Seven-alpha-one-one confirmed. We're go for takeoff."

\----------

On the bridge, Santana notices something on her command center. She yells toward Schuester, "SIR, WE HAVE A BIRD IN MOTION!"

Schuester runs out of the bridge.

Santana activates her comm device, and orders, "Anyone on the deck, we have a rogue bird in motion! We need to shut it down! Repeat, takeoff is not authorized!"

On the deck, Schuester runs out with a missile launcher. A plane takes off town the runway and he fires, taking the plane out. A second jet takes off and Schuester lifts his pistol but it is too far. Angry, he turns back inside, and closes the door to the deck.

Schuester activates his comm device, "Puck, you hear me? You have a missile headed straight for the city!"

\----------

In New York, Iron Man is down on the ground.

Puck perks up when he hears Schuester's voice, "How long?"

Schuester's voice is serious, "Three minutes. Max. Payload can wipe out Midtown."

"JARVIS, put everything we got into the thrusters."

JARVIS' reply is quick, "I just did."

Iron Man blasts away warriors and flies off.

\----------

Elsewhere, the jet fires the nuke towards the city and turns back.

The jet pilot speaks into his radio, "Package is sent. Detonation in two minutes, thirty seconds. Mark."

\----------

In the streets, Finn and Sam catch their respective shield and hammer. Finn and Sam turn and fight off Chitauri warriors. Finn is shot in the ribs and drops to the ground, Sam sends a car rolling towards some of them and then throws Mjolnir the other way. He helps Finn to his feet.

Sam gives him a serious look, "You ready for another bout?"

Finn's in pain, and looks ragged, but isnt ready to give up. He lets out a small huff of laughter and says, "What, you gettin' sleepy?"

\----------

On the roof of Puckerman Tower, Tina has retrieved Jesse's scepter and Dr. Howell is setting up his equipment. He points to the device, "Right at the crown!"

Tina begins to push the spear through the barrier surrounding the cube, it's hard to break, but it slowly gets through.

"I can close it," Tina says rapidly. She takes a deep breath and repeats herself, "Can anybody copy? I can shut the portal down!"

\----------

Below, Finn hears this and reacts, "Do it!"

"No, wait!" Puck shouts over the channel. 

"Puck, these things are still coming!"

"I got a nuke coming in, it's gonna blow in less than a minute." Puck says and flies towards the missile, following closely behind it, "And I know just where to put it."

Iron Man grabs hold of it he begins to redirect it toward the portal.

Finn sounds solemn as he says, "Puck, you know that's a one way trip."

Puck ignores his remark and instructs JARVIS instead, "Save the rest for the turn, J."

JARVIS' tone is sad and suggests, "Shall I try Ms. Berry, sir?"

Puck looks as a smiling image of Rachel Berry comes on over his HUD display. He studies it for a moment before agreeing, "Might as well."

\----------

Elsewhere, a plane is slowly flying through the sky. Aboard, Rachel is watching the news with three others.

She leans forward and listens intently as the reporter speaks, "Streets in New York City have become a battleground. The army is here trying to contain the violence but clearly it is outmatched-"

Rachel's phone starts to vibrate, Puck's face lights up her screen, but she doesn't hear it, too entranced by the news.

On the helicarrier, Schuester and most of the other workers are watching the same report.

Rachel's eyes fill with unshed tears as she listens to the reporter's voice, "...among them, billionaire Noah Puckerman's Iron Man-"

\----------

As they near Puckerman Tower, Iron Man is flying with the missile. As Iron Man flies by, Sam and Finn look to the sky. Iron Man redirects the missile, barely missing the Tower, and pushes it up towards the portal. Hulk, bloodied but alive, looks up too. Puck and the missile go flying by Tina and Dr. Howell, also watching.

And the two sail right into the portal. On the helicarrier, everyone cheers in excitement. 

Well, almost everyone.

Off to the side, Santana looks at Schuester, who smiles sadly to himself.

\----------

In space, Iron Man is carrying the missile. He's traveling towards the Chitauri's mother ship when he sees his HUD display short out. 

JARVIS' voice comes in with static before it shuts off, "Sorry, Miss Ber-"

He lets the nuke go as all the lights in his suit fade out.

Inside the suit, Puck's watches as the missile hits the Chitauri mother ship and it explodes.

Back on earth, everywhere, the Chitauri warriors collapse, and the Leviathans fall from the sky. Sam and Finn look around as they do.

In space, Puck's eyes close as he falls slowly back toward the portal.

On top of the tower, Tina stands waiting. "Come on, Puck," she says softly.

After several seconds, nothing happens. Finn sighs and sounds defeated, "Close it."

Tina plunges the scepter into the heart of the device. The beam turns off and up above, the portal begins to close. 

Just as the portal closes, Puck falls through back to earth. The Avengers look up and see Puck reappear. Finn and Sam look up.

Finn has small smile on his face, "Son of a gun!"

Iron Man plummets to the ground.

Sam's face grows serious, "He's not slowing down!"

Sam starts to swing his hammer in order to fly at Puck and catch him when, with a roar, the Hulk grabs him out of the air, slides far down the side of a building, then twists and leaps off. He crashes to the ground a few feet away.

Hulk throws Iron Man off of him as Sam and Finn run over. Sam pulls off Iron Man's face plate, and throws it behind him. Finn listens for a heartbeat, then sees the arc reactor is not glowing. They all sit back, shocked.

Suddenly, the Hulk roars in anger. Puck gasps and opens his eyes, looking around.

Eyes wide and dazed, Puck asks, "What the hell? What just happened?" He looks around, and adds quickly, "Please tell me nobody kissed me."

Finn lets out a little laugh, and looks around, "We won."

Puck lets out a tired sigh, "Alright, yay! Alright. Good job, guys. Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day." He looks around at the guys around him, "You ever tried shawarma? There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I wanna try it."

Sam sighs, "We're not finished yet."

Puck looks around, and then after a beat, "And then shawarma after?"

\----------

Inside the penthouse of Puckerman tower, Jesse crawls over to a stair. Then, hearing something, he turns back. He sees the Avengers surrounding him. Mike has an arrow aimed at him face. Tina is holding her scepter. Finn and Puck stand ready. Hulk growls.

Jesse rights himself, "If it's all the same to you, I'll have that drink now."

\---------

In Central Park, pulling toward the city of New York. We hear several news reports from New York.

A male reporter starts, "Despite the devastation of what has been confirmed as an extraterrestrial attack, the extraordinary heroics of the group known as the Avengers-"

A New Yorker speaks up, "It's really great knowing they're out there, you know. That someone's watching over us."

A blonde girl screams into the mic, "I love you, Sam!"

A woman speaks infront of a coffee house, "I just don't feel safe with those things out there. It seems like there's a lot the government isn't telling us."

A New York Senator is having a press conference, "These so called heroes have to be held responsible for the destruction done to the city. This was their fight. Where are they now?"

In Central Park, The Avengers and Dr. Howell all walk to the center of a footbridge. Puck is carrying a briefcase, Sam has Jesse in a muzzle and handcuffs, Mike, Tina, Blaine, and Finn walk from cars.

The male reporter continues, "Tough questions are being asked about the Avengers themselves, their sudden appearance and equally sudden disappearance."

The waitress from New York is being interviewed in front of the bank she was held in, "What, that this is all somehow their fault?"

In the conference room on the helicarrier, Schuester talks to Figgins. On another of his screens is the waitress talking on CNN. We see that her name is Marley Rose.

Marley continues, "Captain America saved my life. Wherever he is, and wherever any of them are, I would just- I would wanna say thank you."

Figgins is trying to sound calm, "Where are the Avengers?"

Schuester casually crosses his arms, "I'm not currently tracking their whereabouts. I'd say they've earned a leave of absence."

"And the Tesseract?"

Back in Central Park, Dr. Howell takes a glass cylinder out of a truck. Puck opens his case, which is on the ground. Blaine holds the Cube with some tongs and puts it into the glass cylinder Dr. Howell has.

Schuester answers while they handle the Tesseract, "The Tesseract is it where belongs, out of our reach."

Figgins' look of disappointment is not hard to miss, "That's not your call."

Schuester gives him a little shrug, "I didn't make it. I just didn't argue with the god that did."

In Central Park, Sam is smiling as he shakes hands and says goodbye to Dr. Howell. 

Figgins' voice is barely containing his anger, "So you let him take it..."

Jesse is bound and gagged in the muzzle, anger is radiating off of him. As he looks upon Tina, she turns and whispers something into Mike's ear that makes him smile.

Figgins continues, "And the war criminal Jesse, who should be answering for his crime."

Schuester nods, "Oh, I think he will be."

Sam holds the cylinder that has the Tesseract in it. He gestures it to Jesse, who grabs one end of the cylinder and Sam has the other, he nods to the others and twists the device, which lights up and the two vanish into the sky as the group looks on.

In front of Puck's new Aston Martin, Finn and him shake hands.

Figgins continues to speak, "I don't think you understand what you've started..."

Tina takes a duffel bag out of the backseat of a SHIELD car. She hands it to Blaine as Mike heads to the driver's seat.

"...letting The Avengers loose on this world. They're dangerous."

Puck and Blaine get into his new car and drive off.

Schuester's voice sounds accomplished, "They surely are, and the whole world knows it."

Back to the communication room on the helicarrier. Schuester says pointedly, "Every world knows it!"

"Was that the point in all this? A statement?"

Back in Central Park, Finn is riding a motorcycle. He smiles.

"A promise."

\----------

In the communication room, Figgins signs off and Schuester exits the room.

Santana asks, "Sir, how does it work now...?"

They make their way across the bridge while talking.

Santana continues, "They've gone their separate ways, some pretty extremely far. We get into a situation like this again, what happens then?"

"They'll come back," Schuester says surely. 

They reach the air deck.

A doubtful look crosses her face, "Are you really sure about that?"

He nods, "I am." He looks out over the helicarrier.

"Why?"

He lets out a sigh, "Because we'll need them to."

Santana nods, in respect. She turns and walks back over the bridge and takes a folder from a SHIELD agent. Will stands proud on the air deck.

\----------

In the penthouse of Puckerman Tower. Rachel and Puck are looking at plans for a new tower. 

Where the huge PUCKERMAN on the side of the tower has been destroyed...

...save for the letter "A".

\----------

In space, Terri kneels at the feet of another alien.

"The humans, they are not the cowering wretches we were promised. They stand. They are unruly and therefore cannot be ruled."

The disembodied figure in a chair stands. Terri bows, like she is in pain.

Terri continues, "To challenge them, is to court Death."

The disembodied figure turns and reveals herself to be the mad titan herself- Sue Sylvester. She smiles.

THE END.


	11. Shawarma

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's the shawarma scene. Well, it's what my headcanon came up with. 
> 
> To be warned it's fairly Mike/Tina heavy. I'm a sucker for the master assassins. If that's not your cup of tea, feel free to ignore this. If not, enjoy. :)

She doesn't know if it's because they're with Puck and he can pretty much charm anyone, or the fact that they pretty much just saved the world, but the little joint Puck talked about is eager to have them.

Tina almost forgot how charming Puck could be when he wanted to. One thing she'll never forget is what a hassle it is to take care of him. 

It's a part of her job to always be aware of her surroundings, so she knows that there's at least half a dozen workers and two, maybe three exits. Also due to her line of work, she's used to having eyes on her. It's one of the reasons why her and Mike are such a good team. Where he blends in, she stands out. 

What she's not used to is looking this vulnerable in front of people who aren't Mike or SHIELD medical. But she knows that after what she's been through, hell, what they've all been through, taking a breather isnt the worst idea. 

\----------

Once they've sat down with their food, she can pretty much feel everyone's exhaustion radiating off of them. 

Puck's got cuts along his face and knuckles, and she's sure his nose is broken. Blaine has hulked down and is now fully clothed. He doesn't appear to have any visible injuries, but it there are scorch marks all over his face and arms. She's sure there's more. Finn's got scratches along his face, possibly some bruised ribs from the way he's slouching, and looks minutes away from going to sleep. Sam looks relatively alright aside from scuff marks on his armor, and apparently his appetite is fine as she watches him finish his sandwich and start on his second. Mike's got his elbows propped on the table, rolling his neck from side to side trying to ease some tension. 

She notices something shiny on the back of his arm and realizes it's glass. She rolls her eyes because of course Mike would walk around with shards of glass embedded in his arm and not realize it. She flicks them away with ease and tries not smile at the look of confusion on his face.

Tina's about to bite into her food, when Mike holds out his hand and says, "Hang on."

Mike pulls Tina's chair closer to him, and angles their chairs perfectly so that he can prop up his left leg and ease his knee from throbbing. 

She raises an eyebrow at his movements, but doesn't say anything. 

He brings his basket down to his lap, and leans back against the back of his chair, trying to ease the stiffness that's already started to settle in thanks to landing on his quiver. 

When he's all settled he looks at her and says in an overly exaggerated Southern accent, "Okay, dig in, darlin'." And delivers a wink. 

Tina sends a glare his way, but he can tell that she's not angry due to the corners of her mouth curling slightly upwards. She tries not to smile as she moves a bit forward on her chair to give him a bit more room and takes a bite of her food.

She also notices Puck sending them very curious looks across the table and studiously ignores him. 

When Puck's tired of being ignored, he swallows the food he has in his mouth and throws his wad of napkins on his plate. 

"So," he clears his throat, and waggles a finger between the two assassins, "Is this like a Mr. and Mrs. Smith thing going on? 'Hey, honey, how was your day? How many people did you eviscerate?' Compare favorite kills in bed, type of thing?"

Tina sends a glare Puck's way, and without breaking eye contact, she reaches behind her into Mike's combat boot, and fishes out his butterfly knife. 

She twirls it open and shut a few times before she tosses it to her other hand and seamlessly does the same thing. 

The smirk that was plastered on his face is now gone.

"Don't test me, Puck. I'm armed and irritated," Tina says while pushing some hair back and out of her face, showing off the wound at her hairline.

She sees Mike's fingers twitch. She knows that if they were alone, he would show his concern, but he keeps his face neutral. Besides, he knows that it won't take long for her to heal anyways. 

Blaine notices the wound and his medical training kicks in, and offers to make sure she doesn't have a concussion. She politely declines, but after he insists, she concedes to a check, but once they're done eating. 

\----------

Almost half an hour later, after getting the okay from Blaine, after a call from Schuester confirming that Jesse is being held in a sufficient detention facility, and a frantic call from Rachel making sure Puck was alright, and after Sam leaving with thirds and fourths, they make their way to Puckerman Tower. 

Puck offers them rooms for the night, but explains how his main penthouse is off limits due to the Jesse sized whole in the floor, and smirks towards Blaine with pride.

Mike and her decline the offer and explain how they have places not too far away, which isn't a lie, her place is only a few blocks away, but she knows they'll end up at his place in Bed-Stuy. 

They do ask for a ride, though. Nothing too fancy, and Puck throws them the keys to one of his Range Rovers, and tells them how to get to the parking garage.

\----------

Once they finally make it to Mike's place, they help each other out of their gear. Well she helps him remove his vest and undershirt since he's having trouble raising his arms above his head. And he helps her remove her boots since her ankle's swollen due to her outrunning the Hulk. 

The whole process makes them feel about 80 years old, and in the end they just collapse on Mike's bed in their underwear. 

Mike's on his stomach in his briefs, arms stretched out, hand resting on her the lower part of her stomach, and Tina can definitely see a quiver sized bruise across his back. She's on her back in her sports bra and underwear, left hand over his hand, and her right arm's curled under her head. 

After a few moments of silence, Mike lets out a groan, lifts his head, and asks, "So, post mission sex?"

"Try to mount me, and die," Tina says calmly with her eyes closed.

Mike huffs out a laugh, lowers his head back down, and says into the mattress, "There's the Widow everyone knows and loves."

After another few moments of silence, she opens her eyes and turns toward him. "Hey," she sees him look towards her and then says softly, "I almost lost you today." 

Mike offers her a smile, intertwines their fingers, and says, "It's gonna take more than that to get rid of me."

She squeezes his hand, and they simultaneously move closer to each other. She places a kiss on his lips, and lets him pull her closer to him to curl his arm around her waist. 

While she's not a cuddly person, she's comfortable, and after about 15 minutes she opens her eyes and realizes his breathing has evened out. And after studying his face for a few minutes, she feels herself drift off.


End file.
